WRITTEN EXTEMPORE IN A LADY'S POCKET-BOOK.
GRANT me, indulgent Heav'n, that I may live
To see the miscreants feel the pains they give;
Deal Freedom's sacred treasures free as air,
Till slave and despot be but things which were.
THE HENPECK'D HUSBAND.
CURS'D be the man, the poorest wretch in life,
The crouching vassal to the tyrant wife!
Who has no will but by her high permission;
Who has not sixpence but in her possession;
Who must to her his dear friend's secret tell;
Who dreads a curtain lecture worse than hell.
Were such the wife had fallen to my part,
I'd break her spirit, or I'd break her heart:
I'd charm her with the magic of a switch,
I'd kiss her maids, and kick the perverse bitch.
ONE Queen Artemisia, as old stories tell,
When depriv'd of her husband she loved so well,
In respect for the love and affection he'd show'd her,
She reduc'd him to dust and she drank up the powder.
But Queen Netherplace, of a diff'rent complexion,
When call'd on to order the fun'ral direction,
Would have eat her dead lord, on a slender pretence,
Not to shew her respect, but-to save the expense.
WRITTEN ON A WINDOW OF THE INN AT CARRON.
WE came na here to view your warks
In hopes to be mair wise,
But only, lest we gang to hell,
It may be nae surprise.
But when we tirl'd at your door,
Your porter dought na hear us;
Sae may, shou'd we to hell's yetts come,
Your billy Satan sair us!
ON BEING ASKED WHY GOD HAD MADE MISS DAVIES SO LITTLE
AND MRS. *** SO LARGE.
GIVEN AT A MEETING OF THE DUMFRIES-SHIRE VOLUNTEERS, HELD TO COMMEMORATE THE ANNIVERSARY OF RODNEY'S VICTORY, APRIL 12TH, 1782.
INSTEAD of a Song, boys, I'll give you a Toast,
Here's the memory of those on the twelfth that we lost:
That we lost, did I say? nay, by heav'n, that we found,
For their fame it shall last while the world goes round.
The next in succession, I'll give you the King,
Whoe'er would betray him, on high may he swing!
And here's the grand fabric, our free Constitution,
As built on the base of the great Revolution;
And longer with Politics, not to be cramm'd,
Be Anarchy curs'd, and be Tyranny damn'd;
And who would to Liberty e'er prove disloyal,
May his son be a hangman, and he his first trial!
SAID TO HAVE BEEN WRITTEN BY BURNS, WHILE ON HIS DEATH-BED, TO JOHN RANKINE,
AYRSHIRE, AND FORWARDED TO HIM IMMEDIATELY AFTER the poet's decease.
HE who of Rankine sang, lies stiff and dead;
And a green grassy hillock hides his head;
Alas! alas! a devilish change indeed!
VERSES ADDRESSED TO J. RANKINE,
ON HIS WRITING TO THE POET, THAT A GIRL IN THAT PART OF THE COUNTRY WAS WITH CHILD TO HIM.
ON THE AUTHOR BEING THREATENED WITH HIS RESENTMENT.
SPARE me thy vengeance, Galloway,
In quiet let me live:
I ask no kindness at thy hand,
For thou hast none to give.
ON HEARING THAT THERE WAS FALSEHOOD IN THE
REV. DR. B—'S VERY LOOKS.
THAT there is falsehood in his looks
I must and will deny ;
They say their master is a knave-
And sure they do not lie.
IN politics if thou wouldst mix,
And mean thy fortunes be;
Bear this in mind,-be deaf and blind,
Let great folks hear and see.
IN CLEISH PARISH, FIFESHIRE.
HERE lie Willie Michie's banes ;
O Satan, when ye tak him,
Gie him the schoolin' of your weans,
For clever Deils he'll mak them!
EXTEMPORE IN THE COURT OF SESSION.
WRITTEN AND PRESENTED TO MRS. KEMBLE, ON SEEING HER IN
THE CHARACTER OF YARICO.
KEMBLE, thou cur'st my unbelief
Of Moses and his rod;
At Yarico's sweet notes of grief
The rock with tears had flow'd.
I MURDER hate by field or flood,
Tho' glory's name may screen us;
Dumfries Theatre, 1794
In wars at hame I'll spend my blood,
Life-giving war of Venus.
The deities that I adore
Are social Peace and Plenty,
I'm better pleased to make one more,
Than be the death of twenty.
WRITTEN ON A WINDOW, AT THE KING'S ARMS TAVERN, DUMFRIES.
YE men of wit and wealth, why all this sneering
'Gainst poor Excisemen? give the cause a hearing;
What are your landlords' rent-rolls? taxing ledgers:
What premiers, what? even Monarchs' mighty gaugers:
Nay, what are priests, those seeming godly wise men?
What are they, pray, but spiritual Excisemen?
WRITTEN ON THE WINDOW OF THE GLOBE TAVERN, DUMFRIES.
THE graybeard, Old Wisdom, may boast of his treasures,
Give me with gay Folly to live:
I grant him his calm-blooded, time-settled pleasures,
But Folly has raptures to give.
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