Robert Burns: How To Know Him Part 25

Your heart can ne'er be wanting!

May prudence, fort.i.tude, and truth Erect your brow undaunting.

In ploughman phrase, G.o.d send you speed Still daily to grow wiser; And may ye better reck the rede [heed the advice]

Than ever did th' adviser!

The general level of the rhyming letters of Burns is astonishingly high. They bear, as such compositions should, the impression of free spontaneity, and indeed often read like sheer improvisations. Yet they are sprinkled with admirable stanzas of natural description, shrewd criticism, delightful humor, and are pervaded by a delicate tactfulness possible only to a man with a genius for friendship. They are usually written in the favorite six-line stanza, the meter that flowed most easily from his pen, and in language are the richest vernacular. His ambition to be "literary" seldom brings in its jarring notes here, and indeed at times he seems to avenge himself on this besetting sin by a very individual jocoseness toward the mythological figures that intrude into his more serious efforts. His Muse is the special victim. Instead of the conventional draped figure she becomes a "tapetless, ramfeezl'd hizzie," "saft at best an' something lazy;"

she is a "thowless jad;" or she is dethroned altogether:

"We'll cry nae jads frae heathen hills To help or roose us, [inspire]

But browster wives an' whisky stills-- [brewer]

They are the Muses!"

Again the tone is one of affectionate familiarity:

Leeze me on rhyme! It's aye a treasure, [Blessings on]

My chief, amaist my only pleasure; [almost]

At hame, a-fiel', at wark or leisure, The Muse, poor hizzie, Tho' rough an' raploch be her measure, [homespun]

She's seldom lazy.

Haud to the Muse, my dainty Davie: The warl' may play you monie a shavie, [ill turn]

But for the Muse, she'll never leave ye, Tho' e'er sae puir; [so poor]

Na, even tho' limpin wi' the spavie [spavin]

Frae door to door!

Once more, half scolding, half flattering:

Ye glaikit, gleesome, dainty damies, [giddy]

Wha by Castalia's wimplin streamies [winding]

Lowp, sing, and lave your pretty limbies, [Dance]

Ye ken, ye ken, That strang necessity supreme is 'Mang sons o' men.

The epigrams, epitaphs, elegies, and other occasional verses thrown off by Burns and diligently collected by his editors need little discussion. They not infrequently exhibit the less generous sides of his character, and but seldom demand rereading on account of their neatness or felicity or energy. One may be given as an example:

ON JOHN DOVE, INNKEEPER

Here lies Johnie Pigeon: What was his religion Whae'er desires to ken In some other warl' [world]

Maun follow the carl [Must, old fellow]

For here Johnie Pigeon had none!

Strong ale was ablution; Small beer, persecution; A dram was _memento mori_; But a full flowing bowl Was the saving his soul, And port was celestial glory!

CHAPTER V

DESCRIPTIVE AND NARRATIVE POETRY

The "world of Scotch drink, Scotch manners, and Scotch religion" was not, Matthew Arnold insisted, a beautiful world, and it was, he held, a disadvantage to Burns that he had not a beautiful world to deal with. This famous dictum is a standing challenge to any critic who regards Burns as a creator of beauty. It is true that when Burns took this world at its apparent worst, when Scotch drink meant b.e.s.t.i.a.l drunkenness, when Scotch manners meant shameless indecency, when Scotch religion meant blasphemous defiance, he created _The Jolly Beggars_, which the same critic found a "splendid and puissant production." We must conclude, then, that sufficient genius can sublimate even a hideously sordid world into a superb work of art, which is presumably beautiful.

But the verdict pa.s.sed on the Scottish world of Burns is not to be taken without scrutiny. A review of those poems of Burns that are primarily descriptive will recall to us the chief features of that world.

Let us begin with _The Cotter's Sat.u.r.day Night_, Burns's tribute to his father's house. Let us discard the introductory stanza of dedication, as not organically a part of the poem. The scene is set in a gray November landscape. The tired laborer is shown returning to his cottage, no touch of idealization being added to the picture of physical weariness save what comes from the feeling for home and wife and children. Then follow the gathering of the older sons and daughter, the telling of the experiences of the week, and the advice of the father. The daughter's suitor arrives, and the girl's consciousness as well as the lover's shyness are delicately rendered.

Two stanzas in English moralize the situation, and for our present purpose may be ignored. The supper of porridge and milk and a bit of cheese is followed by a reverent account of family prayers, the father leading, the family joining in the singing of the psalm. And as they part for the night, the poet is carried away into an elevated apostrophe to the country whose foundations rest upon such a peasantry, and closes with a patriotic prayer for its preservation.

The truth of the picture is indubitable. The poet could, of course, have chosen another phase of the same life. The cotter could have come home rheumatic and found the children squalling and the wife cross.

The daughter might have been seduced, and the sons absent in the ale-house. But what he does describe is just as typical, and it is beautiful, though the manners and religion are Scottish.

Another social occasion is the subject of _Halloween_. The poem, with Burns's notes, is a mine of folk-lore, but we are concerned with it as literature. Here the tone is humorous instead of reverent, the characters are mixed, the selection is more widely representative.

With complete frankness, the poet exhibits human nature under the influence of the mating instinct, directed by harmless, age-old superst.i.tions. The superst.i.tions are not attacked, but gently ridiculed. The fundamental veracity of the whole is seen when we realize that, in spite of the strong local color, it is psychologically true for similar festivities among the peasantry of all countries.

HALLOWEEN[4]

Upon that night, when fairies light On Ca.s.silis Downans[5] dance, Or owre the lays, in splendid blaze, [over, pastures]

On sprightly coursers prance; Or for Colean the rout is ta'en, [road]

Beneath the moon's pale beams; There, up the Cove,[6] to stray an' rove Amang the rocks and streams To sport that night;

Amang the bonnie winding banks Where Doon rins wimplin' clear, [winding]

Where Bruce[7] ance ruled the martial ranks [once]

An' shook his Carrick spear, Some merry friendly country-folks Together did convene To burn their nits, an' pou their stocks, [nuts, pull, stalks]

An' haud their Halloween [keep]

Fu' blythe that night:

The la.s.ses feat, an cleanly neat, [trim]

Mair braw than when they're fine; [more handsome]

Their faces blythe fu' sweetly kythe [show]

Hearts leal, an' warm, an' kin': [loyal, kind]

The lads sae trig, wi' wooer-babs [love-knots]

Weel knotted on their garten, [garter]

Some unco blate, an' some wi' gabs [very shy, chatter]

Gar la.s.ses' hearts gang startin' [Make]

Whyles fast at night. [Sometimes]

Then, first and foremost, thro' the kail, Their stocks[8] maun a' be sought ance: [must, once]

They steek their een, an' grape an' wale [shut, eyes, grope, choose]

For muckle anes an' straught anes. [big ones, straight]

Poor hav'rel Will fell aff the drift, [foolish, lost the way]

An' wander'd thro' the bow-kail, [cabbage]

An' pou'd, for want o' better shift, [pulled, choice]

A runt was like a sow-tail, [stalk]

Sae bow'd, that night. [bent]

Then, straught or crooked, yird or nane, [earth]

They roar an' cry a' throu'ther; [pell-mell]

The very wee things toddlin' rin-- [run]

Wi' stocks out-owre their shouther; [over, shoulder]

An' gif the custock's sweet or sour, [if, pith]