Page images
PDF
EPUB

'Ye ken Jack Hornbook i' the Clachan,
Deil mak his king's-hood in a spleuchan!
He's grown sae well acquaint wi' Buchan4
An' ither chaps,

The weans haud out their fingers laughin
And pouk my hips.

'See, here's a scythe, and there's a dart,
They hae pierc'd mony a gallant heart;
But Doctor Hornbook, wi' his art

[ocr errors]

And cursed skill,

Has made them baith no worth a fart,

Damn'd haet they'll kill.

'Twas but yestreen, nae farther gaen, I threw a noble throw at ane;

Wi' less, I'm sure, I've hundreds slain:

But deil-ma-care,

It just play'd dirl on the bane,

But did nae mair.

'Hornbook was by, wi' ready art, And had sae fortify'd the part, That when I looked to my dart,

It was sae blunt,

Fient haet o't wad hae pierc'd the heart
Of a kail-runt.

I drew my scythe in sic a fury,
I near-hand cowpit wi' my hurry,
But yet the bauld Apothecary

Withstood the shock;

I might as weel hae try'd a quarry

O' hard whin rock.

and inspiration, is at once an Apothecary, Surgeon, and Physician.

4 Buchan's Domestic Medicine.

E 2

'Ev'n them he canna get attended,

Altho' their face he ne'er had kend it, in a kail-blade, and send it,

Just

As soon's he smells't,

Baith their disease, and what will mend it,
At once he tells't.

'And then, a' doctor's saws and whittles,
Of a' dimensions, shapes, an' mettles,
A' kinds o' boxes, mugs, an' bottles,

He's sure to hae;

Their Latin names as fast he rattles
As A B C.

'Calces o' fossils, earth, and trees;
True Sal-marinum o' the seas;
The Farina of beans and pease,

He has❜t in plenty;

Aqua-fontis, what you please,

He can content ye.

'Forbye some new, uncommon weapons, Urinus Spiritus of capons;

Or Mite-horn shavings, filings, scrapings,

Distill'd per se;

Sal-alkali o' Midge-tail clippings,

And mony mae.'

Waes me for Johnie Ged's Hole' now,' Quo' I, if that the news be true!

His braw calf-ward whare gowans grew,

Sae white and bonnie,

Nae doubt they'll rive it wi' the plew;

They'll ruin Johnie!

5 The gravedigger.

The creature grain'd an eldritch laugh,
And says, 'Ye needna yoke the pleugh,
Kirkyards will soon be till'd eneugh,

Tak ye nae fear:

They'll a' be trench'd wi' mony a sheugh
In twa-three year.

'Whare I kill'd ane a fair strae death, By loss o' blood or want of breath, This night I'm free to tak my aith,

That Hornbook's skill

Has clad a score i' their last claith,

By drap an' pill.

'An honest Wabster to his trade,

Whase wife's twa nieves were scarce weel bred, Gat tippence-worth to mend her head,

When it was sair;

The wife slade cannie to her bed,

But ne'er spak mair.

A countra Laird had ta'en the batts, Or some curmurring in his guts,

His only son for Hornbook sets,

An' pays him weel.

The lad, for twa guid gimmer pets,

Was laird himsel.

A bonnie lass, ye kend her name,
Some ill-brewn drink had hov'd her wame:
She trusts hersel, to hide the shame,

In Hornbook's care;

Horn sent her aff to her lang hame,

To hide it there.

That's just a swatch o' Hornbook's way;
Thus goes he on from day to day,
Thus does he poison, kill, an' slay,

An's weel paid for't;

Yet stops me o' my lawfu' prey,

Wi' his damn'd dirt:

'But, hark! I'll tell you of a plot,
Tho' dinna ye be speaking o't;
I'll nail the self-conceited Scot

As dead's a herrin:

Niest time we meet, I'll wad a groat,

He gets his fairin!'

But just as he began to tell,

The auld kirk-hammer strak the bell
Some wee short hour ayont the twal,

Which rais'd us baith:

I took the way that pleas'd mysel,

And sae did Death.

THE BRIGS OF AYR.

A Poem.

INSCRIBED TO J. B********

ESQ. AYR.

THE simple Bard, rough at the rustic plough,
Learning his tuneful trade from ev'ry bough;
The chanting linnet, or the mellow thrush, [bush;
Hailing the setting sun, sweet, in the green thorn
The soaring lark, the perching redbreast shrill,
Or deep-ton'd plovers, grey, wild-whistling o'er
the hill;

Shall he, nurst in the Peasant's lowly shed,
To hardy Independence bravely bred,
By early Poverty to hardship steel'd,

And train'd to arms in stern Misfortune's field;
Shall he be guilty of their hireling crimes,
The servile, mercenary Swiss of rhymes?
Or labour hard the panegyric close,

With all the venal soul of dedicating Prose?
No! though his artless strains he rudely sings,
And throws his hand uncouthly o'er the strings,
He glows with all the spirit of the Bard,
Fame, honest fame, his great, his dear reward.
Still, if some Patron's gen'rous care he trace,
Skill'd in the secret, to bestow with grace;
When B********* befriends his humble name,
And hands the rustic stranger up to fame,
With heart-felt throes his grateful bosom swells,
The godlike bliss, to give, alone excels.

'Twas when the stacks gat on their winter hap, And thack and rape secure the toil-worn crap; Potatoe-bings are snugged up fra skaith Of coming Winter's biting, frosty breath; The bees, rejoicing o'er their summer toils, Unnumber'd buds an' flow'rs' delicious spoils, Seal'd up wi' frugal care in massive waxen piles, Are doom'd by man, that tyrant o'er the weak, The death o' devils smoor'd wi' brimstone reek: The thundering guns are heard on ev'ry side, The wounded coveys, reeling, scatter wide; The feather'd field-mates, bound by Nature's tie, Sires, mothers, children, in one carnage

lie:

(What warm, poetic heart, but inly bleeds, And execrates man's savage, ruthless deeds !)

« PreviousContinue »