No More Learning

You know, I dare say, of an application I lately made to your Board to
be admitted an officer of Excise. I have, according to form, been
examined by a supervisor, and to-day I gave in his certificate, with a
request for an order for instructions. In this affair, if I succeed, I
am afraid I shall but too much need a patronizing friend. Propriety of
conduct as a man, and fidelity and attention as an officer, I dare
engage for; but with anything like business, except manual labour, I
am totally unacquainted.

I had intended to have closed my late appearance on the stage of life,
in the character of a country farmer; but after discharging some
filial and fraternal claims, I find I could only fight for existence
in that miserable manner, which I have lived to see throw a venerable
parent into the jaws of a jail; whence death, the poor man's last and
often best friend, rescued him.

I know, Sir, that to need your goodness, is to have a claim on it; may
I, therefore, beg your patronage to forward me in this affair, till I
be appointed to a division; where, by the help of rigid economy, I
will try to support that independence so dear to my soul, but which
has been too often so distant from my situation.

R. B.

* * * * *




CXXIX.


TO WILLIAM CRUIKSHANK.

[The verses which this letter conveyed to Cruikshank were the lines
written in Friars-Carse Hermitage: "the first-fruits," says the poet,
elsewhere, "of my intercourse with the Nithsdale muse. "]

_Ellisland, August, 1788. _

I have not room, my dear friend, to answer all the particulars of your
last kind letter. I shall be in Edinburgh on some business very soon;
and as I shall be two days, or perhaps three, in town, we shall
discuss matters _viva voce. _ My knee, I believe, will never be
entirely well; and an unlucky fall this winter has made it still
worse.
I well remember the circumstance you allude to, respecting
Creech's opinion of Mr. Nicol; but, as the first gentleman owes me
still about fifty pounds, I dare not meddle in the affair.

It gave me a very heavy heart to read such accounts of the consequence
of your quarrel with that puritanic, rotten-hearted, hell-commissioned
scoundrel A----. If, notwithstanding your unprecedented industry in
public, and your irreproachable conduct in private life, he still has
you so much in his power, what ruin may he not bring on some others I
could name?

Many and happy returns of seasons to you, with your dearest and
worthiest friend, and the lovely little pledge of your happy union.
May the great Author of life, and of every enjoyment that can render
life delightful, make her that comfortable blessing to you both, which
you so ardently wish for, and which, allow me to say, you so well
deserve! Glance over the foregoing verses, and let me have your blots.

Adieu.

R. B.

* * * * *




CXXX.


TO MRS. DUNLOP.

[The lines on the Hermitage were presented by the poet to several of
his friends, and Mrs. Dunlop was among the number. ]

_Mauchline, August 2, 1788.