Now, Robinson, harangue nae mair,
But steek your gab for ever:
Or try the wicked town of Ayr,

For there they'll think you clever;
Or, nae reflection on your lear,
Ye may commence a shaver;

Or to the Netherton repair,
And turn a carpet-weaver

Aff-hand this day.

Mutrie and you were just a match,
We never had sic twa drones :
Auld Hornie did the Laigh Kirk watch,
Just like a winkin' baudrons :

And ay' he catch'd the tither wretch,
To fry them in his caudrons :
But now his honour maun detach,
Wi' a' his brimstone squadrons,

Fast, fast this day.

See, see auld Orthodoxy's faes

She's swingein through the city;

Hark, how the nine-tail'd cat she plays! I vow its unco pretty :

There, Learning, with his Greekish face,

Grunts out some Latin ditty;

And Common Sense is gaun, she says,

To mak to Jamie Beattie

Her plaint this day.

But there's Morality himsel',

Embracing all opinions;

Hear, how he gies the tither yell,
Between his twa companions;
See, how she peels the skin an' fell,
As ane were peelin' onions!

Now there they're packed aff to hell,

And banish'd our dominions,

Henceforth this day.

O, happy day! rejoice, rejoice!
Come bouse about the porter!
Morality's demure decoys

Shall here nae mair find quarter:
Mackinlay, Russell, are the boys,
That Heresy can torture:
They'll gie her on a rape a hoyse,
And cowe her measure shorter

By th' head some day.

Come, bring the tither mutchkin in,
And here's, for a conclusion,

Το

every New Light* mother's son,

From this time forth, Confusion :

*New Light" is a cant phrase, in the West of Scotland, for those religious opinions which Dr. Taylor of Norwich has defended so strenuously.

If mair they deave us with their din,
Or Patronage intrusion,

We'll light a spunk, and, ev'ry skin,

We'll rin them aff in fusion

Like oil, some day.

John Russell, minister of Kilmarnock, against whom Burns bent the bitterest shafts of his satire, was a very remarkable man. For all that is graceful in expression, or vivid in delineation in the following sketch, I am indebted to Hugh Millar, mason in Cromarty.-" Russell came from Moray; he obtained the school of Cromarty, was no favourite with the scholars, and was one of those who mistake severity for duty. He was a large, robust, dark-complexioned man, imperturbably grave, fierce of temper, and had a stern expression of countenance. It is said that a lady, who had been one of his pupils, actually fainted when she heard him, many years afterwards, speak of transgressions from the pulpit. One of his boys, who usually carried the key of the school in his pocket, happened to lose it one day, and got such a flogging that, when he grew to be a man, in all cases of mental perturbation and misery he groped in his pocket, as he did on that fatal morning for the key. He became popular as a preacher: his manner was strong and energetic: the severity of his temper was a sort of genius to him while he described, which he loved to do, the tortures of the wicked in a future state. He printed some of his sermons they are of a controversial nature, and written in a bold, rough style, and fitter to be listened to than read. He set himself against sabbath-breaking; and used to take his stand at one of the streets leading from the town, and turn transgressors back by the shoulders."

"It was not an unwelcome call to some of the citizens, which took Russell from Cromarty to a chapel of ease in Kilmarnock. A native of Cromarty, who happened to be at that time in the west of Scotland, walked to Mauchline to hear his old schoolmaster preach at the Sacrament; this was about 1792. There was an excellent sermon to be heard from the tent, and excellent drink to be had in a neighbouring ale-house, and between the two the people seemed much divided. A young clergyman was preaching, and Russell was nigh him : at every fresh movement of the people, or ungodly burst of sound from the ale-house, the latter would raise himself on tiptoe-look sternly towards the change-house, and then at his younger brother in the pulpit: at last his own time to preach arrived-he sprang into the tent-closed the bible--and without psalm or prayer, or other preliminary matter, burst out at once in a passionate and eloquent address upon the folly and sin which a portion of the people were committing. The sound in the ale-house ceased the inmates came out and listened to the denunciation, which some of them remembered with a shudder in after-life. He lived to a great age, and was always a dauntless and intrepid man: when seventy years old or so, he saw a Cromarty man beaten down in the streets of Stirling Russell elbowed the crowd aside, plucked the sufferer, like a brand from the burning, saying—' Waes me, that your father's son should behave like a blackguard in the town where I am a minister.' He grew temperate in his sermons as he grew old, and became a great favourite with the more grave and staid portion of his people." In look and manner, and fortitude of character, Russell seems to have resembled the Poet not a little. "The Ordination" is the only one of Burns' Old Light satires which he admitted into the first edition: it was written when Mackinlay was called to Kilmarnock.

:

THE CALF.

TO THE REV. MR. JAMES STEVEN,

On his Text, MALACHI IV. 2.—" And they shall go forth, and grow up, like CALVES of the stall."

RIGHT, Sir! your text I'll prove it true,
Though Heretics may laugh;

For instance; there's yoursel' just now,
God knows, an unco Calf!

And should some patron be so kind,
As bless you wi' a kirk,

I doubt na, Sir, but then we'll find,
Ye're still as great a Stirk.

But, if the lover's raptur'd hour
Shall ever be your lot,

Forbid it, ev'ry heavenly power,

You e'er should be a Stot!

Tho', when some kind, connubial dear,

Your but-and-ben adorns,

The like has been that you may wear
A noble head of horns.