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TO THE SONS OF BURNS,

AFTER VISITING THE GRAVE OF THEIR FATHER.

'The Poet's grave is in a corner of the churchyard. We looked at 'it with melancholy and painful reflections, repeating to each 'other his own verses

"Is there a man whose judgment clear,' &c.'

Extract from the Journal of my Fellow-traveller.

'MID crowded obelisks and urns

I sought the untimely grave of Burns;
Sons of the Bard, my heart still mourns
With sorrow true;

And more would grieve, but that it turns
Trembling to you! †

Through twilight shades of good and ill
Ye now are panting up life's hill,
And more than common strength and skill
Must ye display;

If ye would give the better will
Its lawful sway.

Hath Nature strung your nerves to bear
Intemperance with less harm, beware!
But if the Poet's wit ye share,

* Miss Wordsworth in her Journal minutely describes this visit, which, she says, took place on the 18th of August, 1803. She remarks that there is no thought surviving in connection with Burns' daily life that is not heart-depressing.

This stanza is not in the Edition of 1815.

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For honest men delight will take
To spare your failings for his sake,+
Will flatter you,-and fool and rake
Your steps pursue;

And of your Father's name will make
A snare for you.

Far from their noisy haunts retire,
And add your voices to the quire
That sanctify the cottage fire
With service meet;

There seek the genius of your Sire,
His spirit greet;

Or where, 'mid 'lonely heights and hows,'
He paid to Nature tuneful vows;
Or wiped his honourable brows

Bedewed with toil,

While reapers strove, or busy ploughs
Upturned the soil;

His judgment with benignant ray
Shall guide, his fancy cheer, your way;
But ne'er to a seductive lay

* Strong-bodied if ye be to bear
Intemperance with less harm, beware!
But if your father's wit ye share,

Then, then indeed,

Ye sons of Burns! for watchful care
There will be need.-Edit. 1815.

To show you favor for his sake.-Edit. 1815.

Let faith be given ;

Nor deem that 'light which leads astray,
Is light from Heaven.**

Let no mean hope your souls enslave;
Be independent, generous, brave ;
Your Father such example gave,
And such revere ;

But be admonished by his grave,
And think, and fear!

TO THE SPADE OF A FRIEND.†

(AN AGRICULTURIST.)

COMPOSED WHILE WE WERE LABOURING TOGETHER IN HIS

PLEASURE-GROUND.

SPADE! with which Wilkinson hath tilled his lands,‡ And shaped these pleasant walks by Emont's side, Thou art a tool of honour in my hands;

I press thee, through the yielding soil, with pride.

Rare master has it been thy lot to know;
Long hast Thou served a man to reason true;
Whose life combines the best of high and low,
The labouring many§ and the resting few;

*The three stanzas of which this is the last, did not appear in the Edition of 1815.

+ Written in 1804.

There is an interesting notice of this person dictated by Mr. Wordsworth. (See Life, I. 323.) He was, says Mr. W., "a Quaker by religious profession; by natural constitution of mind-or shall I venture to say by God's grace ?-he was something better."

§ The toiling many.-Edit. 1815.

Health, meekness, ardour, quietness secure,*
And industry of body and of mind;
And elegant enjoyments, that are pure
As nature is;-too pure to be refined.†

Here often hast Thou heard the Poet sing
In concord with his river murmuring by ;
Or in some silent field, while timid spring
Is yet uncheered by other minstrelsy.

Who shall inherit Thee when death has laid
Low in the darksome cell thine own dear lord?
That man will have a trophy, humble Spade!
A trophy nobler than a conqueror's sword.

If he be one that feels, with skill to part
False praise from true, or, greater from the less,
Thee will he welcome to his hand and heart,
Thou monument of peaceful happiness!

He will not dread with Thee a toilsome day-
Thee his loved servant, his inspiring mate!
And, when thou art past service, worn away,
No dull oblivious nook shall hide thy fate.+

His thrift thy uselessness will never scorn ;
An heir-loom in his cottage wilt thou be :—
High will he hang thee up, well pleased to adorn
His rustic chimney with the last of Thee!

* Health, quiet, meekness, ardour, hope secure.-Edit. 1815. This is a remarkable expression, which invites more commentary than there is room for in a foot-note.-ED.

Thee a surviving soul shall consecrate.-Edit. 1815.

WRITTEN IN GERMANY,*

ON ONE OF THE COLDEST DAYS OF THE CENTURY.

The Reader must be apprised, that the Stoves in North-Germany generally have the impression of a galloping horse upon them, this being part of the Brunswick Arms.

A PLAGUE on your languages, German and Norse !
Let me have the song of the kettle;

And the tongs and the poker, instead of that horse
That gallops away with such fury and force
On this dreary dull plate of black metal. +

See that Fly, a disconsolate creature! perhaps
A child of the field or the grove ;

And, sorrow for him! the dull treacherous heat
Has seduced the poor fool from his winter retreat,
And he creeps to the edge of my stove.

Alas! how he fumbles about the domains
Which this comfortless oven environ !

He cannot find out in what track he must crawl,
Now back to the tiles, then in search of the wall,
And now on the brink of the iron.

* Written at Goslar in the winter of 1798-99, which was one of remarkably severe cold.

After this, the Edition of 1815 contained the following stanza :—

Our Earth is no doubt made of excellent stuff,

But her pulses beat slower and slower:

The weather in Forty was cutting and rough,

And then, as Heaven knows, the Glass stood low enough;
And now it is four degrees lower.

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