The Canongate Burns (91 page)
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Authors: Robert Burns
Inclosing A Copy Of
Holy Willie's Prayer
Sept. 17, 1785
First published by Cromek, 1808.
WHILE at the stook the shearers cow'r
corn sheaves, bend down
To shun the bitter blaudin' show'r,
shelter, belting
Or in gulravage rinnin scow'r
horseplay, running, rush about
       To pass the time,
5
To you I dedicate the hour
       In idle rhyme.Â
My musie, tir'd wi' mony a sonnet
many
On gown, an' ban', an' douse black bonnet,
clerical robes, sombre
Is grown right eerie now she's done it,
frightened
10
       Lest they should blame her,
An' rouse their holy thunder on it
       And anathem her.
curse
I own 'twas rash, an' rather hardy,
That I, a simple, countra Bardie,
country
15
Should meddle wi' a pack sae sturdy,
so
       Wha, if they ken me,
who, know
Can easy, wi' a single wordie,
word
       Louse Hell upon me.
let loose
But I gae mad at their grimaces,
go
20
Their sighan, cantan, grace-prood faces,
hypocritical, -proud
Their three-mile prayers, an' hauf-mile graces,
half-
       Their raxan conscience,
stretching
Whase greed, revenge, an' pride disgraces
whose
       Waur nor their nonsense.
worse than
25
There's
Gau'n,
1
miska't waur than a beast,
miscalled, worse
Wha has mair honor in his breast who,
Than mony scores as guid's the priest
many, good as
       Wha sae abus't him:
who so, abused
And may a Bard no crack his jest
30
       What way they've use't him?
See him, the poor man's friend in need,
The gentleman in word an' deed,
An' shall his fame an' honor bleed
       By worthless skellums,
scoundrels
35
An' not a Muse erect her head
       To cowe the blellums?
threaten, bullies
O Pope, had I thy satire's darts
To gie the rascals their deserts,
give
I'd rip their rotten, hollow hearts,
40
       An' tell aloud
Their jugglin hocus-pocus arts
       To cheat the crowd.
God knows, I'm no the thing I should be,
not
Nor am I even the thing I cou'd be,
45
But twenty times, I rather would be
       An atheist clean,
Than under gospel colors hid be
       Just for a screen.
An honest man may like a glass,
50
An honest man may like a lass,
But mean revenge, an' malice fause
false
       He 'll still disdain,
An' then cry zeal for gospel laws,
       Like some we ken.
know
55
They take Religion in their mouth;
They talk o' Mercy, Grace, an' Truth,
For what? âTo gie their malice skouth
give, play
       On some puir wight,
poor
An' hunt him down, o'er right an' ruth,
pity
60
       To ruin streight.
straight
All hail, Religion! maid divine!
Pardon a Muse sae mean as mine,
so
Who in her rough imperfect line
       Thus daurs to name thee;
dares
65
To stigmatize false friends of thine
       Can ne'er defame thee.
Tho' blotch't and foul wi' mony a stain,
many
An' far unworthy of thy train,
With trembling voice I tune my strain
70
       To join with those,
Who boldly dare thy cause maintain
       In spite of foes:
In spite o' crowds, in spite o' mobs,
In spite of undermining jobs,
75
In spite o' dark banditti stabs
bandit-like
       At worth an' merit,
By scoundrels, even wi' holy robes
       But hellish spirit.
O Ayr! my dear, my native ground,
80
Within thy presbytereal bound
A candid lib'ral band is found
       Of public teachers,
As men, as Christians too renown'd
       An' manly preachers.
85
Sir, in that circle you are nam'd;
Sir, in that circle you are fam'd;
An' some, by whom your doctrine's blam'd
       (Which gies ye honor)
gives
Even Sir, by them your heart's esteem'd,
90
       An' winning manner.
Pardon this freedom I have ta'en,
taken
An' if impertinent I've been,
Impute it not, good Sir, in ane
one
       Whase heart ne'er wrang'd ye,
whose, wronged
95
But to his utmost would befriend
       Ought that belang'd ye.
anything, belonged to
Â
Previous editors note that John McMath (d. 1825), a native of Galston, graduated M. A. at Glasgow in 1772, and was ordained assistant and successor (1782) to Patrick Wodrow, minister of Tarbolton. He was, like Wodrow, a âNew Licht' moderate. He âunhappily-fell into low spirits, in consequence of his dependent situation, and he became dissipated' (ChambersâWallace, i. 193). In 1791 he resigned and enlisted as a private soldier.
The poem was obviously written to accompany âHoly Willie's Prayer' combining as it does Burns's examination of his own capacity to take on such a formidable enemy (ll. 13â18) with a further defence (ll. 25â41) of Holy Willie's arch-enemy, Gavin Hamilton. His wish for Pope's satirical power to assault the Auld Lichts is not an empty one; this poem is as fine as anything Burns wrote on their perverted, hypocritical Christianity. Also it resonates (ll. 73â8) with images similar to those anti-clerical ones found in Blake's
Songs of Experience
though he and his great English contemporary knew nothing of each other's work.
For the relationship of Burns to Blake, see Catherine Carswell, âRobert Burns', in
From Anne to Victoria,
ed. Bonamy Dobree (London, 1937), pp. 405â21; Leopold Damrosch, âBurns, Blake and the Recovery of the Lyric',
Studies in Romanticism,
21 (Winter, 1982), pp. 637â60 and Andrew Noble, âBurns, Blake and Romantic Revolt',
The Art of Robert Burns,
ed. Jack & Noble (London, 1982), pp. 191â204.
1
Gavin Hamilton.
First printed by Wallace, 1896.
When Eighty-five was seven months auld,
old
       And wearing thro' the aught,
eighth
When rolling rains and Boreas bauld
north wind, bold/stormy
       Gied farmer-folks a faught;
gave, fight
5
Ae morning quondam Mason Will,
1
one
       Now Merchant Master Miller,
Gaed down to meet wi' Nansie Bell
2
went
       And her Jamaica siller,
money
              To wed, that day. âÂ
10
The rising sun o'er Blacksideen
3
       Was just appearing fairly,
When Nell and Bess
4
get up to dress
       Seven lang half-hours o'er early!
long
Now presses clink and drawers jink,
15
       For linnens and for laces;
But modest Muses only
think
       What ladies' under dress is,
              On sic a day. â
such
But we'll suppose the stays are lac'd,
20
       And bony bosom steekit;
handsome, held firmly
Tho', thro' the lawn â but guess the rest â
       An Angel scarce durst keekit:
would look
Then stockins fine, o' silken twine,
       Wi' cannie care are drawn up;
prudent
25
An' gartened tight, whare mortal wight â
where
              â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦
5
But now the gown wi' rustling sound,
       Its silken
6
pomp displays;
Sure there's nae sin in being vain
no
       O' siccan bonie claes!
such pretty clothes
Sae jimp the waist, the tail sae vast â
so narrow, behind so
       Trouth, they were bonie Birdies!
O Mither Eve, ye wad been grave
would have
       To see their ample hurdies
buttocks
              Sae large that day!!!
so
Then Sandy
7
wi's red jacket bra',
with his, fine
       Comes, whip-jee-whoa! about,
whipping to stop the horses
And in he gets the bonie twa â
two
       Lord, send them safely out!
And auld John Trot
8
wi' sober phiz
old, face
       As braid and bra's a Bailie,
broad, fine
His shouthers and his Sunday's giz
shoulders, wig
       Wi' powther and wi' ulzie
powder, oil
              Weel smear'd that dayâ¦.
9
well
Burns sent this poem to Mrs Dunlop on 21st August, 1788 with this note: âYou would know an Ayr-shire lad, Sandy Bell who made a Jamaica fortune, & died sometime ago. âAWilliam Miller, formerly a Mason, nowa Merchant in this place, married a sister german of Bell's for the sake of a
£
500 her brother had left her.âASister of Miller'swho was then Tenant of my heart for the time being, huffed my Bardship in the pride of her new Connection; & I, in the heat of my resentment resolved to burlesque the whole business, & began as follows' (Letter 265). Implicit in the burlesque is the brilliant formal joke of situating these prosperous bourgeois in the context of the poetic, Breughelesque peasant brawl form used in
The Holy Fair.
As Galt's novels also testify, money from imperial enterprise was flooding into Scotland; these were the upwardly mobile, showy ânabobs'. Dress, especially women's dress, reflected this excess consumption. Regarding the protuberances (ll. 30â4) Kinsley notes cf. Creech, who was later to be Burns's publisher: âSpinal tenuity and mamillary exuberance, have for some time been the fashion with the fair, but a posterior rotundity, or a balance was wanting behind; and you may now tell the country lasses if they wish to be fashionable, they must resemble two blown bladders tied together at the necks' (S. Maxwell and R. Hutchison,
Scottish Costume
1550â1850
, 1958, pp. 89â90). Burns's apparent forgetfulness of that below-the-belt comment of l. 27 was undoubtedly devised to save Mrs Dunlop from further offence.
1
William Miller, a friend of Burns in Mauchline.
2
Nansie Bell, who inherited
£
500 from her brother who died in Jamaica, married Wm. Miller.
3
A hill. R.B.
4
Miller's two sisters. R.B. [Elizabeth and Helen].
5
As I never wrote it down, my recollection does not entirely serve me. â R.B. Ms.
6
The ladies' first silk gowns, got for the occasion. R.B
7
Driver of the post chaise. R.B.
8
Miller's father. R.B.
9
Against my Muse had come thus far, Miss Bess and I were more in Unison, so I thought no more of the Piece. R.B. Ms.
First published by Currie, 1800.
Hail, Poesie! thou Nymph reserv'd!
In chase o' thee, what crowds hae swerv'd
pursuit, have
Frae Common Sense, or sunk enerv'd
from
              'Mang heaps o' clavers;
nonsense
5
And och! o'er aft thy joes hae starv'd
often, lovers, have
              'Mid a' thy favours!Â
Say, Lassie, why thy train amang,
among
While loud the trumps heroic clang,
noise
And Sock and buskin skelp alang
drama symbols, move briskly
10
              To death or marriage;
Scarce ane has tried the Shepherd-sang
one, -song
              But wi' miscarriage?
In Homer's craft Jock Milton thrives;
Eschylus' pen Will Shakespeare drives;
15
Wee Pope, the knurlin, till him rives
dwarf, clutches
              Horatian fame;
In thy sweet sang, Barbauld
1
, survives
              Even Sappho's flame.
But thee, Theocritus, wha matches?
who
20
They're no Herd's
2
ballats, Maro's catches;
Squire Pope but busks his skinklin patches
smartens up, shining
              O' Heathen tatters:
fragments
I pass by hunders, nameless wretches,
hundreds
              That ape their betters.
imitate
25
In this braw age o' wit and lear,
fine, knowledge
Will nane the Shepherd's whistle mair
none, more
Blaw sweetly in its native air
blow
              And rural grace,
And wi' the far-fam'd Grecian share
30
              A rival place?
Yes! there is ane; a Scottish callan!
one, fellow
There's ane: come forrit, honest Allan!
one, forward
Thou need na jouk behint the hallan,
not hide behind, partition
              A chiel sae clever;
chap so
35
The teeth o' Time may gnaw Tamtallan,
3
chew/turn to rubble
              But thou's for ever.
Thou paints auld Nature to the nines,
old
In thy sweet Caledonian lines;
Nae gowden stream thro' myrtles twines
no golden, meanders
40
              Where Philomel,
While nightly breezes sweep the vines,
              Her griefs will tell!
Thy rural loves are Nature's sel';
self
Nae bombast spates o' nonsense swell;
no, floods
45
Nae snap conceits, but that sweet spell
no
              O' witchin loove,
That charm that can the strongest quell,
              The sternest move.
In gowany glens thy burnie strays,
flowery, burn
50
Where bonie lasses bleach their claes;
pretty, clothes
Or trots by hazelly shaws and braes
bushes, hill sides
              Wi' hawthorns gray,
Where blackbirds join the shepherd's lays
              At close o' day.Â
Ultimately, rightly authenticated by Kinsley, there had been doubt about this being by Burns. Despite a holograph, Gilbert Burns thought it not his brother's in the amended Currie edition of 1820. ScottâDouglas (1867) and HenleyâHenderson (1896) repeated the old chestnut of Burns's classic knowledge being inadequate to the poem's range of allusion. The image of the restricted ploughman poet dies hard. In actual fact no Scottish vernacular voice in the late eighteenth century spoke with this degree and, indeed, intelligent ease of allusion. See, for example, the compressed comparisons (ll. 13â18) between classical and English literary achievement. Given as we now know that Burns not only avidly read about the classical world but transcribed parts of Gibbon's
Decline and Fall,
as surviving holograph notes in the Wisbech and Fenland Museum reveal.
The poem's range of allusion is easily within his range. Characteristic of him, too, is the notion that post-Ramsay, there is a potential in the Scottish vernacular to achieve a quality of realistic pastoral poetry not achieved since the golden days of Greece. Certainly Wordsworth, trying himself to break through to a new plain rural speech, considered Burns had got there before him. See Andrew Noble âWordsworth and Burns: The Anxiety of Being under the Influence', in
Critical Essays on Robert Burns,
ed. McGuirk, GK. Hall (1998), pp. 49â62.