THE COTTAR'S FAMILY WORSHIP.

(ROBERT BURNS.)

The cheerfu' supper done, wi' serious face,
They round the ingle form a circle wide;
The sire turns o'er, wi' patriarchal grace,
The big ha' Bible, ance his father's pride:
His bonnet rev'rently is laid aside,

His lyart haffets wearing thin and bare;
Those strains that once did sweet in Zion glide,
He wales a portion with judicious care;

And "Let us worship God!" he says with solemn air.

They chant their artless notes in simple guise; They tune their hearts, by far the noblest aim: Perhaps "Dundee's" wild warbling measures rise, Or plaintive "Martyrs," worthy of the name: Or noble "Elgin" beats the heavenward flame, The sweetest far of Scotia's holy lays: Compared with these Italian trills are tame; The tickled ears no heartfelt raptures raise; Nae unison ha'e they with our Creator's praise.

The priest-like father reads the sacred page,
How Abram was the friend of God on high;
Or, Moses bade eternal warfare wage
With Amalek's ungracious progeny ;
Or how the royal bard did groaning lie
Beneath the stroke of Heaven's avenging ire;
Or, Job's pathetic plaint, and wailing cry;
Or rapt Isaiah's wild seraphic fire;
Or other holy seers that tune the sacred lyre.

Perhaps the Christian volume is the theme,
How guiltless blood for guilty man was shed;
How He, who bore in heaven the second name,
Had not on earth whereon to lay His head;
How His first followers and servants sped;

The precepts sage they wrote to many a land:
How he, alone in Patmos banished,

Saw in the sun a mighty angel stand;

And heard great Bab'lon's doom pronounced by Heaven's command.

Then kneeling down, to Heaven's Eternal King,
The saint, the father, and the husband prays:
Hope "springs exulting on triumphant wing,"
That thus they all shall meet in future days:
There ever bask in uncreated rays,

No more to sigh, or shed the bitter tear,
Together hymning their Creator's praise,
In such society, yet still more dear;

While circling time moves round in an eternal sphere.

Compared with this, how poor religion's pride,
In all the pomp of method, and of art,
When men display to congregations wide,
Devotion's every grace except the heart!
The power incensed, the pageant will desert,
The pompous strain, the sacerdotal stole;
But haply, in some cottage far apart,

May hear, well pleased, the language of the soul:
And in His book of life the inmates poor enrol.

Then homeward all take off their several way;
The youngling cottagers retire to rest :
The parent pair their secret homage pay,
And proffer up to heaven the warm request
That He who stills the raven's clamorous nest,
And decks the lily fair in flowery pride,
Would, in the way His wisdom sees the best,
For them and for their little ones provide ;

But chiefly in their hearts with grace divine preside.

From scenes like these old Scotia's grandeur springs,
That makes her loved at home, revered abroad:
Princes and lords are but the breath of kings,
"An honest man 's the noblest work of God:"

P

And certes, in fair virtue's heavenly road, The cottage leaves the palace far behind; What is a lordling's pomp! a cumbrous load, Disguising oft the wretch of human kind, Studied in arts of hell, in wickedness refined!

O Scotia ! my dear, my native soil!

For whom my warmest wish to heaven is sent!
Long may thy hardy sons of rustic toil

Be blest with health, and peace, and sweet content!
And, oh! may Heaven their simple lives prevent
From luxury's contagion, weak and vile!

Then, howe'er crowns and coronets be rent,
A virtuous populace may rise the while,

And stand a wall of fire around their much loved isle.

O Thou! who poured the patriotic tide

That streamed through Wallace's undaunted heart ; Who dared to nobly stem tyrannic pride, Or nobly die, the second glorious part, (The patriot's God, peculiarly Thou art, His friend, inspirer, guardian, and reward!) Oh! never, never Scotia's realm desert; But still the patriot, and the patriot bard, In bright succession raise, her ornament and guard!

THE JACKDAW OF RHEIMS.

(From the "Ingoldsby Legends.")

The Jackdaw sat on the Cardinal's chair!
Bishop, and abbot, and prior were there;
Many a monk, and many a friar,

Many a knight, and many a squire,
With a great many more of lesser degree,—
In sooth a goodly company;

And they served the Lord Primate on bended knee.

Never, I ween,

Was a prouder seen,

Read of in books, or dreamt of in dreams,
Than the Cardinal Lord Archbishop of Rheims !
In and out

Through the motley rout,

That little Jackdaw kept hopping about;
Here and there

Like a dog in a fair,

Over comfits and cates,
And dishes and plates,

Cowl and cope, and rochet and pall,
Mitre and crozier! he hopp'd upon all!
With saucy air,

He perch'd on the chair

Where, in state, the great Lord Cardinal sat
In the great Lord Cardinal's great red hat;
And he peer'd in the face
Of his Lordship's Grace,
With a satisfied look, as if he would say,
"We two are the greatest folks here to-day!"
And the priests, with awe,

As such freaks they saw,

Said, "The devil must be in that little Jackdaw!"

The feast was over, the board was clear'd,

The flawns and the custards had all disappear'd,

And six little singing-boys,

dear little souls!

In nice clean faces, and nice white stoles,

Came, in order due,

Two by two,

Marching that grand refectory through!
A nice little boy held a golden ewer,
Emboss'd, and fill'd with water as pure

As any that flows between Rheims and Namur,
Which a nice little boy stood ready to catch
In a fine golden hand-basin made to match.
Two nice little boys, rather more grown,
Carried lavender-water and eau de Cologne ;

And a nice little boy had a nice cake of soap
Worthy of washing the hands of the Pope.
One little boy more

A napkin bore,

Of the best white diaper, fringed with pink,
And a Cardinal's Hat mark'd in "permanent ink.”

The great Lord Cardinal turns at the sight
Of these nice little boys dress'd all in white:
From his finger he draws
His costly turquoise ;

And, not thinking at all about little Jackdaws,
Deposits it straight

By the side of his plate,

While the nice little boys on his Eminence wait;
Till, when nobody's dreaming of any such thing,
That little Jackdaw hops off with the ring!

There's a cry and a shout,
And a deuce of a rout,

And nobody seems to know what they're about,
But the monks have their pockets all turn'd inside out;
The friars are kneeling,

And hunting, and feeling

The carpet, the floor, and the walls, and the ceiling.
The Cardinal drew

Off each plum-colour'd shoe,

And left his red stockings exposed to the view;
He peeps, and he feels

In the toes and the heels;

They turn up the dishes,—they turn up the plates,— They take up the poker and poke out the grates, They turn up the rugs,

They examine the

mugs

But, no-no such thing;

They can't find THE RING!

And the Abbot declared that, "when nobody twigg'd it, Some rascal or other had popp'd in, and prigg'd it!"