[This letter was first
published
in the Edinburgh Chronicle.
Robert Burns
--When I tell you even * * * has lost its power to please, you
will guess something of my hell within, and all around me--I begun
_Elibanks and Elibraes_, but the stanzas fell unenjoyed, and
unfinished from my listless tongue: at last I luckily thought of
reading over an old letter of yours, that lay by me in my book-case,
and I felt something for the first time since I opened my eyes, of
pleasurable existence. ---- Well--I begin to breathe a little, since I
began to write to you. How are you, and what are you doing? How goes
Law? Apropos, for connexion's sake, do not address to me supervisor,
for that is an honour I cannot pretend to--I am on the list, as we
call it, for a supervisor, and will be called out by and bye to act as
one; but at present, I am a simple gauger, tho' t'other day I got an
appointment to an excise division of 25_l. per annum_ better than the
rest. My present income, down money, is 70_l. per annum. _
I have one or two good fellows here whom you would be glad to know.
R. B.
* * * * *
CCXXIII.
TO COL. FULLARTON.
OF FULLARTON.
[This letter was first published in the Edinburgh Chronicle. ]
_Ellisland, 1791. _
SIR,
I have just this minute got the frank, and next minute must send it to
post, else I purposed to have sent you two or three other bagatelles,
that might have amused a vacant hour about as well as "Six excellent
new songs," or, the Aberdeen 'Prognostication for the year to come. ' I
shall probably trouble you soon with another packet. About the gloomy
month of November, when 'the people of England hang and drown
themselves,' anything generally is better than one's own thought.
Fond as I may be of my own productions, it is not for their sake that
I am so anxious to send you them. I am ambitious, covetously ambitious
of being known to a gentleman whom I am proud to call my countryman; a
gentleman who was a foreign ambassador as soon as he was a man, and a
leader of armies as soon as he was a soldier, and that with an eclat
unknown to the usual minions of a court, men who, with all the
adventitious advantages of princely connexions and princely fortune,
must yet, like the caterpillar, labour a whole lifetime before they
reach the wished height, there to roost a stupid chrysalis, and doze
out the remaining glimmering existence of old age.
If the gentleman who accompanied you when you did me the honour of
calling on me, is with you, I beg to be respectfully remembered to
him.
I have the honour to be,
Sir,
Your highly obliged, and most devoted
Humble servant,
R. B.
* * * * *
CCXXIV.
TO MISS DAVIES.
[This accomplished lady was the youngest daughter of Dr. Davies, of
Tenby, in Pembrokeshire: she was related to the Riddels of Friar's
Carse, and one of her sisters married Captain Adam Gordon, of the
noble family of Kenmure. She had both taste and skill in verse. ]
It is impossible, Madam, that the generous warmth and angelic purity
of your youthful mind, can have any idea of that moral disease under
which I unhappily must rank us the chief of sinners; I mean a
torpitude of the moral powers, that may be called, a lethargy of
conscience.
will guess something of my hell within, and all around me--I begun
_Elibanks and Elibraes_, but the stanzas fell unenjoyed, and
unfinished from my listless tongue: at last I luckily thought of
reading over an old letter of yours, that lay by me in my book-case,
and I felt something for the first time since I opened my eyes, of
pleasurable existence. ---- Well--I begin to breathe a little, since I
began to write to you. How are you, and what are you doing? How goes
Law? Apropos, for connexion's sake, do not address to me supervisor,
for that is an honour I cannot pretend to--I am on the list, as we
call it, for a supervisor, and will be called out by and bye to act as
one; but at present, I am a simple gauger, tho' t'other day I got an
appointment to an excise division of 25_l. per annum_ better than the
rest. My present income, down money, is 70_l. per annum. _
I have one or two good fellows here whom you would be glad to know.
R. B.
* * * * *
CCXXIII.
TO COL. FULLARTON.
OF FULLARTON.
[This letter was first published in the Edinburgh Chronicle. ]
_Ellisland, 1791. _
SIR,
I have just this minute got the frank, and next minute must send it to
post, else I purposed to have sent you two or three other bagatelles,
that might have amused a vacant hour about as well as "Six excellent
new songs," or, the Aberdeen 'Prognostication for the year to come. ' I
shall probably trouble you soon with another packet. About the gloomy
month of November, when 'the people of England hang and drown
themselves,' anything generally is better than one's own thought.
Fond as I may be of my own productions, it is not for their sake that
I am so anxious to send you them. I am ambitious, covetously ambitious
of being known to a gentleman whom I am proud to call my countryman; a
gentleman who was a foreign ambassador as soon as he was a man, and a
leader of armies as soon as he was a soldier, and that with an eclat
unknown to the usual minions of a court, men who, with all the
adventitious advantages of princely connexions and princely fortune,
must yet, like the caterpillar, labour a whole lifetime before they
reach the wished height, there to roost a stupid chrysalis, and doze
out the remaining glimmering existence of old age.
If the gentleman who accompanied you when you did me the honour of
calling on me, is with you, I beg to be respectfully remembered to
him.
I have the honour to be,
Sir,
Your highly obliged, and most devoted
Humble servant,
R. B.
* * * * *
CCXXIV.
TO MISS DAVIES.
[This accomplished lady was the youngest daughter of Dr. Davies, of
Tenby, in Pembrokeshire: she was related to the Riddels of Friar's
Carse, and one of her sisters married Captain Adam Gordon, of the
noble family of Kenmure. She had both taste and skill in verse. ]
It is impossible, Madam, that the generous warmth and angelic purity
of your youthful mind, can have any idea of that moral disease under
which I unhappily must rank us the chief of sinners; I mean a
torpitude of the moral powers, that may be called, a lethargy of
conscience.
