No More Learning

Tell yon guid bluid o' auld Boconnock's
I'll be his debt twa mashlum bonnocks,
An' drink his health in auld Nanse Tinnock's[48]
Nine times a-week,
If he some scheme, like tea an' winnocks,
Wad kindly seek.

Could he some commutation broach,
I'll pledge my aith in guid braid Scotch,
He need na fear their foul reproach
Nor erudition,
Yon mixtie-maxtie queer hotch-potch,
The Coalition.

Auld Scotland has a raucle tongue;
She's just a devil wi' a rung;
An' if she promise auld or young
To tak their part,
Tho' by the neck she should be strung,
She'll no desert.

An' now, ye chosen Five-and-Forty,
May still your mither's heart support ye,
Then, though a minister grow dorty,
An' kick your place,
Ye'll snap your fingers, poor an' hearty,
Before his face.

God bless your honours a' your days,
Wi' sowps o' kail and brats o' claise,
In spite o' a' the thievish kaes,
That haunt St. Jamie's:
Your humble Poet signs an' prays
While Rab his name is.

POSTSCRIPT.

Let half-starv'd slaves in warmer skies
See future wines, rich clust'ring, rise;
Their lot auld Scotland ne'er envies,
But blythe and frisky,
She eyes her freeborn, martial boys,
Tak aff their whiskey.

What tho' their Phoebus kinder warms,
While fragrance blooms and beauty charms!
When wretches range, in famish'd swarms,
The scented groves,
Or hounded forth, dishonour arms
In hungry droves.

Their gun's a burden on their shouther;
They downa bide the stink o' powther;
Their bauldest thought's a' hank'ring swither
To stan' or rin,
Till skelp--a shot--they're aff, a' throther
To save their skin.

But bring a Scotsman frae his hill,
Clap in his check a Highland gill,
Say, such is royal George's will,
An' there's the foe,
He has nae thought but how to kill
Twa at a blow.

Nae could faint-hearted doubtings tease him;
Death comes, wi' fearless eye he sees him;
Wi' bluidy han' a welcome gies him;
An' when he fa's,
His latest draught o' breathin' lea'es him
In faint huzzas!

Sages their solemn een may steek,
An' raise a philosophic reek,
An' physically causes seek,
In clime an' season;
But tell me whiskey's name in Greek,
I'll tell the reason.

Scotland, my auld, respected mither!
Tho' whiles ye moistify your leather,
Till whare ye sit, on craps o' heather
Ye tine your dam;
Freedom and whiskey gang thegither! --
Tak aff your dram!

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 46: Sir Adam Ferguson. ]

[Footnote 47: The Duke of Montrose. ]

[Footnote 48: A worthy old hostess of the author's in Mauchline, where
he sometimes studies politics over a glass of guid auld Scotch drink. ]

* * * * *




XXXIX.

ADDRESS TO THE UNCO GUID,

OR THE

RIGIDLY RIGHTEOUS.

"My son, these maxims make a rule,
And lump them ay thegither;
The Rigid Righteous is a fool,
The Rigid Wise anither:
The cleanest corn that e'er was dight
May hae some pyles o' caff in;
So ne'er a fellow-creature slight
For random fits o' daffin. "

SOLOMON. --Eccles. ch. vii. ver. 16.

["Burns," says Hogg, in a note on this Poem, "has written more from
his own heart and his own feelings than any other poet. External
nature had few charms for him; the sublime shades and hues of heaven
and earth never excited his enthusiasm: but with the secret fountains
of passion in the human soul he was well acquainted.