No. CLXXXVI. TO MR. ALEXANDER DALZEL, FACTOR, FINDLAYSTON. MY DEAR SIR, Ellisland, 19th March, 1791. I HAVE taken the liberty to frank this letter to you, as it encloses an idle poem of mine, which I send you; and God knows you may perhaps pay dear enough for it if you read it through. Not that this is my own opinion; but the author by the time he has composed and corrected his work, has quite pored away all his powers of critical discrimination. I can easily guess from my own heart, what you have felt on a late most melancholy event. God knows what I have suffered, at the loss of my best friend, my first and dearest patron and benefactor; the man to whom I owe all that I am and have! I am gone into mourning for him, and with more sincerity of grief than I fear some will, who by nature's ties ought to feel on the occasion. I will be exceedingly obliged to you indeed, to let me know the news of the noble family, how the poor mother and the two sisters support their loss. I had a packet of poetic bagatelles ready to send to Lady Betty, when I saw the fatal tidings in the newspaper. I see by the same channel that the honoured REMAINS of my noble patron, are designed, to be brought to the family burial place. Dare I trouble you to let me know privately before the day of interment, that I may cross the country, and steal among the crowd, to pay a tear to the last sight of my ever revered benefactor? It will oblige me beR. B. yond expression. [This gentleman, the factor, or steward, of Burns's noble friend, Lord Glencairn, with a view to encourage a second edition of the poems, laid the volume before his lordship, with such an account of the rustic bard's situation and prospects as from his slender acquaintance with him he could furnish. The result, as communicated to Burns by Mr. Dalzel, is highly creditable to the character of Lord Glencairn. After reading the book, his lordship declared that its merits greatly exceeded his expectation, and he took it with him as a literary curiosity to Edinburgh. He repeated his wishes to be of service to Burns, and desired Mr. Dalzel to inform him, that in patronizing the book, ushering it with effect into the world, or treating with the booksellers, he would most willingly give every aid in his power; adding his request, that Burns would take the earliest opportunity of letting him know in what way or manner he could best further his interests. CROMEK.] No. CLXXXVII. TO LADY W. M. CONSTABLE. MY LADY, Ellisland, 11th January, 1791. : NOTHING less than the unlucky accident of having lately broken my right arm, could have prevented me the moment I received your ladyship's elegant present by Mrs. Miller, from returning you my warmest and most grateful acknowledgments, I assure your ladyship, I shall set it apart the symbols of religion shall only be more sacred. In the moment of poetic composition, the box shall be my inspiring genius. When I would breathe the comprehensive wish of benevolence for the happiness of others, I shall recollect your ladyship; when I would interest my fancy in the distresses incident to humanity, I shall remember the unfortunate Mary. R. B. [This letter was written acknowledging the present of a valuable snuff-box, with a fine picture of Mary Queen of Scots on the lid. This was the gift of Lady Winni fred Maxwell Constable, of the noble family of Nithsdale: a lady equally generous and gentle, and who was not the less respected by the people around because her house had suffered in the cause of the Stuarts. The possessions of the family were once very ample: but few estates thrive in civil wars, rebellions, and confiscations: one noble barony after another passed out of the hands of the Maxwells: and the title was extinguished, never, I fear, to be revived. The baronial Castle of Caerlaverock on the Solway, and the College of Lincluden on the banks of the Nith, are still included in the family possessions, and are preserved with more care than what is usual with ruins in the South of Scotland. At the family seat, the bed in which Queen Mary slept, during her flight from the fatal field of Langside: a letter from Charles the First, summoning Lord Maxwell with as many armed men as he could muster, to aid him in supporting the crown against the Parliament: and the letter from the last Countess, describing the all but miraculous escape of her husband from the Tower of London in 1715-unite in telling the history of the House of Nithsdale, and the cause the honourable cause of its decline. ED.] MADAM, No. CLXXXVIII. TO MRS. GRAHAM, OF FINTRAY. Ellisland, 1791. 7 WHETHER it is that the story of our Mary Queen of Scots, has a peculiar effect on the feelings of a poet, or whether I have in the inclosed ballad, succeeded beyond my usual poetic success, I know not; but it has pleased me beyond any effort of my muse for a good while past; on that account I inclose it particularly to you. It is true, the purity of my motives may be suspected. I am already deeply indebted to Mr. Graham's goodness; and what, in the usual ways of men, is of infinitely greater importance, Mr. G. can do me service of the utmost importance in time to come. I was born a poor dog; and however I may occasionally pick a better bone than I used to do, I know I must live and die poor: but I will indulge the flattering faith that my poetry will considerably outlive my poverty; and without any fustian affectation of spirit, I can promise and affirm, that it must be no ordinary craving of the latter shall ever make me do any thing injurious to |