No. CCXL.

TO MR. JAMES JOHNSON.

MY DEAR FRIEND,

Dumfries, 1794.

You should have heard from me long ago; but over and above some vexatious share in the pecuniary losses of these accursed times, I have all this winter been plagued with low spirits and blue devils, so that I have almost hung my harp on the willow

trees.

I am just now busy correcting a new edition of my poems, and this with my ordinary business, finds me in full employment.

I send you by my friend Mr. Wallace forty-one songs for your fifth volume; if we cannot finish it any other way, what would you think of Scots words to some beautiful Irish airs? In the mean time, at your leisure, give a copy of the Museum to my worthy friend, Mr. Peter Hill, Bookseller, to bind for me, interleaved with blank leaves, exactly as he did the Laird of Glenriddel's, that I may insert every anecdote I can learn, together with my own criticisms and remarks on the songs. A copy of this kind I shall leave with you, the editor, to publish at some after period, by way of making the Museum a

book famous to the end of time, and you renowned for ever.

I have got an Highland Dirk, for which I have great veneration; as it once was the dirk of Lord Balmerino. It fell into bad hands, who stripped it of the silver mounting, as well as the knife and fork. I have some thoughts of sending it to your care, to get it mounted anew.

Thank you for the copies of my Volunteer Ballad. -Our friend Clarke has done indeed well! 'tis chaste and beautiful. I have not met with any thing that has pleased me so much. You know I am no Connoisseur: but that I am an Amateur-will be allowed me.

R. B.

["Burns's anxiety with regard to the correctness of his writings was very great. Being questioned as to his mode of composition, he replied, All my poetry is the effect of easy composition, but of laborious correction."" CROMEK.]

No. CCXLI.

TO PETER MILLER, JUN. ESQ.

DEAR SIR,

OF DALS WINTON.

Dumfries, Nov. 1794.

YOUR offer is indeed truly generous, and most sincerely do I thank you for it; but in my present situation, I find that I dare not accept it. You well know my political sentiments; and were I an insular individual, unconnected with a wife and a family of children, with the most fervid enthusiasm I would have volunteered my services: I then could and would have despised all consequences that might have ensued.

My prospect in the Excise is something; at least, it is, encumbered as I am with the welfare, the very existence, of near half-a-score of helpless individuals, what I dare not sport with.

In the mean time, they are most welcome to my Ode; only, let them insert it as a thing they have met with by accident and unknown to me.-Nay, if Mr. Perry, whose honour, after your character of him I cannot doubt; if he will give me an address and channel by which any thing will come safe from those spies with which he may be certain that his

I

correspondence is beset, I will now and then send him any bagatelle that I may write. In the present hurry of Europe, nothing but news and politics will be regarded; but against the days of peace, which Heaven send soon, my little assistance may perhaps fill up an idle column of a newspaper. have long had it in my head to try my hand in the way of little prose essays, which I propose sending into the world through the medium of some newspaper; and should these be worth his while, to these Mr. Perry shall be welcome; and all my reward shall be, his treating me with his paper, which, by the bye, to any body who has the least relish for wit, is a high treat indeed.

With the most grateful esteem, I am ever,
Dear Sir,

R. B.

["In a conversation with his friend Mr. Perry, (the proprietor of "The Morning Chronicle,") Mr. Miller represented to that gentleman the insufficiency of Burns's salary to answer the imperious demands of a numerous family. In their sympathy for his misfortunes, and in their regret that his talents were nearly lost to the world of Letters, these gentlemen agreed on the plan of settling him in London. To accomplish this most desirable object, Mr. Perry, very spiritedly, made the Poet an handsome offer of an annual stipend for the exercise of his talents in his newspaper. Burns's reasons for refusing this offer are stated in the present letter." CROMEK.]

No. CCXLII.

TO MR. SAMUEL CLARKE, Jun.

DUMFRIES.

Sunday Morning.

DEAR SIR,

I was, I know, drunk last night, but I am sober this morning. From the expressions Capt. made use of to me, had I had nobody's welfare to care for but my own, we should certainly have come, according to the manners of the world, to the necessity of murdering one another about the business. The words were such as, generally, I believe, end in a brace of pistols; but I am still pleased to think that I did not ruin the peace and welfare of a wife and a family of children in a drunken squabble. Farther you know that the report of certain political opinions being mine, has already once before brought me to the brink of destruction. I dread lest last night's business may be misrepresented in the same way.-You, I beg will take care to prevent it. I tax your wish for Mr. Burns's welfare with the task of waiting as soon as possible, on every gentleman who was present, and state this to him, and, as you please,