natural elevation of a generous mind." The humble position of the Poet in society implied dependance: when Burns left the stubble-field, washed his toil-hardened hands, and sat down at a rich man's table, he could not but feel that, as a ploughman, he was out of his place, and dreaded naturally enough that his entertainers might think themselves wondrous condescending. Gavin Hamilton was descended from the Hamiltons of Kype in Lanarkshire, and not at all related, as has been said, to the curate of Kirk-Oswald, who had a hand in bringing in "the Highland host" upon the Westlan Whigs in 1677. The true cause of the paltry, spiteful persecution of Hamilton by “ Daddy Auld” is related at large in the Session books: the Presbytry of Ayr ordered the record to be expunged as frivolous; but one of the house of Hamilton desired that it might remain as an instance of the arrogance of the Kirk Session. One of the charges -the sternest one-has been put neatly into rhyme by Burns: "He sometimes gallops on a Sunday, And pricks the beast as if 'twere Monday." "It is related," says Chambers, "of the laird of Kype, that he was once paying a visit to the Duke of Hamilton, when his grace inquired in what degree he was related to the ducal house, and whereabouts in the family tree the race of Kype was to be found. It would be needless to seek the root among the branches,' answered the haughty laird, who perhaps had some pretensions to be of the principal stock of the Hamiltons, or knew at least that the claims of the ducal house to the chiefship were by no means clear." ELEGY ON THE DEATH OF ROBERT RUISSEAUX. Now Robin lies in his last lair, He'll gabble rhyme, nor sing nae mair, Cauld poverty, wi' hungry stare, Nae mair shall fear him; Nor anxious fear, nor cankert care, E'er mair come near him. To tell the truth, they seldom fash't him, Then wi' a rhyme or song he lash't 'em Tho' he was bred to kintra wark, And counted was baith wight and stark, Yet that was never Robin's mark To mak a man; But tell him, he was learned and clark, Cromek found this fragment among the papers of Burns, and printed it in the Reliques, with the intimation only that Ruisseaux was a play upon the Poet's own name. It is probably a portion of a poem in which he desired to dissect himself, and shew his evil and his good to the world; but not having commenced so happily as he wished, threw it aside, and resumed the subject in that noble and touching strain, "The Bard's Epitaph."-"He meets us in his compositions," says Campbell, undisguised as a peasant; at the same time his observations go extensively into life, like those of a man who felt the proper dignity of human nature in the character of a peasant." Perhaps of all poets Burns poured most of himself into poetry. Byron appears in his verse as in a mask, and never comes fairly and unhesitatingly forward; of Scott, as he says of his namesake, "Some saw an arm, and some a hand, Of Campbell personally we know nothing from his verse ; nor has Southey shewn himself. Burns painted his own portrait, and did it so darkly, that others have presumptuously increased the gloom in their delineations of his character. LETTER TO JAMES TAIT, OF GLENCONNER. AULD Comrade dear, and brither sinner, What wives and wabsters see and feel. But, hark ye, friend! I charge you strictly, Till by an' by, if I haud on, My heart-warm love to guid auld Glen, God bless them a' wi' grace and gear! My auld schoolfellow, preacher Willie, May he be dad, and Meg the mither, An' Lord, remember singing Sannock, Wi' hale breeks, saxpence, an' a bannock, |