a partition between the door and the ingle. hain'd means liter keb ally 'hedged-in,' 'inclosed;' hence 'kept,' 'preserved.' buck: . a cheese that is made with ewe milk mixed with cow's milk.'- Scott, Old Mortality, Cap. VIII. towmond twelvemonth. fell sharp, biting. sin' = when. lint = flax. i' the 100-108. ha'-Bible; the Bible kept in the hall or principal room of the cottage. See note on 'ben,' line 64. lyart haffets = gray temples. wales chooses; cognate with the German 'Wahl,' choice. Let us worship God. [Robert] had frequently remarked to me that he thought there was something peculiarly venerable in the phrase "Let us worship God," used by a decent sober head of a family introducing family worship. To this sentiment of the author, the world is indebted for The Cotter's Saturday Night. Gilbert Burns (brother of the poet). 109-126. Dundee; Martyrs; Elgin; names of hymn-tunes. beets kindles; originally (1) 'to make better;' (2) 'to mend' (the fire). It is from the same root as boots (= profits), for which see note on Lycidas, 64. Italian trills are tame. That depends upon whether you are an Italian or a Scotchman. Burns' acquaintance with Italian music was more than limited. 127-135. The priest-like father. It is well known that this portrait is intended for Burns' own father. the royal Bard David. = lone Patmos. St. John the Apostle was banished to this island in his old age. great Bab'lon's doom; as told in Revelation XVIII. 136-162. For line 138, see Pope's Windsor Forest, 111-112: See! from the brake the whirring pheasant springs, stole. An ecclesiastical vestment worn by priests in the Anglican, Roman Catholic and Greek Churches. It is a long, narrow strip of silk, drawn over the shoulders and hanging down in front to about the knees. 163-171. With line 165 compare line 53 of Goldsmith's Deserted Village. Line 167 is line 247 of the Fourth Epistle in Pope's Essay on Man. 172-180. With the exception of the last line, this stanza is a somewhat commonplace paraphrase of sentiments scattered through The Deserted Village. 11-189. Wallace (d. 1305) was Burns' favorite hero. His story is told in Scott's Tales of a Grandfather, First Series, Cap. VII. See Burns' Bannockburn, p. 112, of this book. TAM O'SHANTER. Goldsmith justly considered ten lines of The Deserted Village a good morning's work; Burns, incredible as it may seem, actually wrote Tam O'Shanter in one day! The scene is laid within sight of Burns' birth-place, near which the ruins of Alloway Kirk may still be seen. Brownyis (Brownies) were supposed to be friendly spirits that haunted farm-houses; Bogilis (Bogies) were evil spirits. chapman billies = pedlar fellows. drouthy dry, I-12. thirsty. street. gate = road, often confused with gate meaning a 'door.' In the meaning of 'road,' the word survives in many street-names, as Bishopsgate, Kirkgate, and is cognate with the German Gasse nappy strong ale; ale that makes you' nap.' unco (a dialectal reduction of uncouth') = wonderfully; very. slaps gaps in fences. 13-36. Tam O'Shanter. The honor of being the original of this famous character is conceded to one Douglas Graham of the Shanter Farm in the parish of Kirkoswald. His tombstone and that of his shrewish wife are still to be seen in the parish churchyard. skellum scoundrel. blethering = blathering = foolish-talking. The form‘Blatherskite' (and the creature) are as well known in the United States as in Scotland. noisy fellow. 6 = blellum = ilka melder every grinding (of your meal). ca'd. See note on ca,' Cotter's Saturday Night, 30. Kirkton; the village where stands the parish church. warlocks= wizards. mirk (murk) = darkness. gars. See note on Cotter's Saturday Night, 44. greet weep. 37-58. reaming swats= foaming ale; Goldsmith's 'mantling bliss.' Souter Shoemaker. 59-78. tide opportunity. See note on 'tides,' in The Deserted Village, 209. = hurried. whiles at times. Whiles' is 79-96. skelpit the adverbial genitive of the Old English 'hwil,' meaning ' time.' The Scotch use, illustrated here, preserves the original meaning better than does the English use. smoored smothered. whins furze or gorse. birks birches. meikle = big. the cairn in Burns' time was covered with trees, and a few fields to the left, as you follow the old road from Ayr to Maybole, stands the house in which he was born. 97-110. bore hole (in the wall). favorite subject with Burns. corn: John Barleycorn. A (too) See his inimitable ballad, John Barley There were three kings into the east, Three kings both great and high, And they hae sworn a solemn oath boddle. A Scotch coin, issued under Charles II., value 2d.; sometimes called a ' turner.' III-124. winnock-bunker window-seat. in the east (end skirl = scream. of the church). touzie tyke = shaggy cur. dirl tremble. It has long been a seriously debatable question whether it is possible to extract music from Scotch bag-pipes. The great authority of Burns cannot be quoted on the affirmative, for you will notice he does not say that auld Nick succeeded in giving the company music, but merely that it was his charge [duty] to give them music. All that the poet's utmost patriotism can assert is that the bag-pipes did scream.' A later and scarcely less eminent authority (Mr. Gilbert), in his pathetic ballad Ellen McJones Aberdeen, comes out less dubitatively in favor of the bag-pipes: 'Let's show,' said McClan, 'to this Sassenach loon He blew at his 'Cottage,' and blew with a will, It was wild, it was fitful; as wild as the breeze 'Hech gather, hech gather, hech gather around; = 125-142. These are the weakest lines in the poem. Instead of entering into The Horrible and carrying us with him, the author stands outside and laughs at it. We feel all the time that there was really nothing for Tam to be frightened at. cantrip magic. unchristen'd bairns. The belief that unchristened babies went to hell was very common during the Dark Ages, and was the origin of the custom of baptizing them within three days of birth. The only evidence we have that Shakespeare was born on the 23d of April is the entry in the register of Trinity Church, Stratford, that he was baptized on the 26th. gab mouth. This word is related to the name of our friend Gobbo, who had the infection to serve.' 143-162. cleekit carlin old woman. = clutched. Rig woodie; from rig (ridge), the back + widdie (withy) = the rope that goes over a horse's back to support the shafts; hence, 'twisted,' spean cause to vomit. 'mis-shapen.' staff with crooked head. crummock = a was equal to an English pound. common except in the expression Auld Lang-Syne tint (preterite of 'tine') lost. Ago. 193-205. Notice how admirably the similes are adapted to the subject; homely and lively. fyke bustle. byke hive. 206-229. key-stane. 'It is a well-known fact that witches, or any evil spirits, have no power to follow a poor wight any farther than the middle of the next running stream. It may be proper, likewise, to mention to the benighted traveller that when he falls in with bogles, whatever danger there may be in his going forward, there is much more hazard in turning back.’— Burns. ettle intention. -- This poem carries the reader along with a rush, by means of a kind of Homeric liveliness and directness. With an exception already noted, there is hardly a dull line to be found; the incidents are duly subordinated to the main action, and the interest is not allowed to flag a moment before the end. Burns' acquaintance with Greek literature was probably nil, yet in design and execution his poem is thoroughly Greek that is, in accordance with the best models. A quotation from Matthew Arnold will make this clear: 'The radical difference between the poetic theory of the Greeks and our own is this: That with them the poetical character of the action in itself, and the conduct of it, was the first consideration; with us, attention is fixed mainly on the value of the separate thoughts and images which occur in the treatment of an action. They regarded the whole we regard the parts.' TO A MOUSE. Burns' father died in 1784. Upon Robert and Gilbert Burns fell the responsibility of supporting the widowed mother and her younger children. The young men made a brave effort. They leased a small farm (Mossgiel) near Lochlea, and toiled early and late; in two seasons — thanks to bad seed, poor soil and a late harvest — they lost nearly everything they had. This overset all my wisdom,' Burns wrote despairingly; in this little poem he has expressed this same thought with a mournful pathos drawn from his own sad experiences. hurry. a small spade for cleaning See note on Tam O'Shanter, 83. icker ear (of corn). I-24. brattle the plough. whiles. occasional. pattle = thrave = daimen twenty-four sheaves, set up in the field. Night, 72. = = piercing; cognate with the German schnell quick. But without (the original meaning). 25-48. snell cranreuch hald = hoar-frost. a-gley = awry. TO A MOUNTAIN DAISY. This is another poem written in those depressing days at Mossgiel and coming straight from Burns' heart. 37-54. card; a synecdoche for 'compass.' Pope has the same figure with nearly the same application : On life's vast ocean diversely we sail, Essay on Man, ii. 107-108. 'This passage,' Warton tells us, 'is exactly copied from Fontenelle.' Thus do the poets live off each other! - Or shall we rather say, with more conventional dignity: Thus do the poets hand down from age to age the intellectual treasures of their stock in trade? When Burns was living, he asked of the world bread and they gave him a stone. When he was dead and wanted nothing, they builded him a tawdry monument; nay, worse, two tawdry monuments, one on the banks of Doon, near Alloway Kirk, the other at Dumfries. To injury they added insult by inscribing on the latter a long eulogium in doubtful Latin. Better had they have cut thereon Such is the fate of simple Bard, On life's rough ocean luckless starr'd! BANNOCKBURN. Burns' expressed sympathy with the French Revolution came near costing him his place in the Excise; he was instructed by his superior officer (one |