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The bright fire is shining upon the clean hearth;
The goodwife is spreading her daiutiest cheer;
The house is alive with the music and mirth

That wakes but at Christmas, the pride of the year!

Bring in the green holly, the box, and the yew,
The fir, and the laurel, all sparkling with rime;
Hang up to the ceiling the misletoe bough,
And let us be merry another yule-time !

ANONYMOUS.

PROCRASTINATION.

FROM ELIZA COOK'S JOURNAL."

SHUN delays, they breed remorse;
Take thy time while time is lent thee;
Creeping snails have weakest force;

Fly thy fault lest thou repent thee;
Good is best when soonest wrought;
Lingering labours come to nought.

Hoist up sail while gale doth last;

Tide and wind wait no man's pleasure;
Seek not time when time is past;

Sober speed is wisdom's leisure;
Afterwits are dearly bought;

Let thy forewit guide thy thought.

THOU BONNY WOOD OF CRAIGIE LEA.

ROBERT TANNAHILL, BORN IN PAISLEY, JUNE 3, 1774, DIED MAY 17, 1810.

THOU bonny wood of Craigie Lea!
Thou bonny wood of Craigie Lea!

Near thee I pass'd life's early day,

And won my Mary's heart in thee.

The broom, the brier, the birken bush,
Bloom bonny o'er thy flowery lea;
And a' the sweets that ane can wish
Frae Nature's hand, are strew'd on thee.

Far ben thy dark green planting's shade,
The cushat croodles amorously;
The mavis, down thy bughted glade,
Gars echo ring frae every tree.

Awa,' ye thoughtless, murdering gang,
Wha tear the nestlings ere they flee!
They'll sing you yet a canty sang,
Then, O in pity let them be!

When Winter blaws in sleety showers
Frae aff the Norland hills sae high,
He lightly skiffs thy bonny bowers,
As laith to harm a flower in thee.

Though fate should drag me south the line,
Or o'er the wide Atlantic sea,

The happy hours I'll ever min',

That I in youth ha'e spent in thee.'
Thou bonny wood of Craigie Lea.

THE MIDGES DANCE ABOON THE BURN.

ROBERT TANNAHILL.

THE midges dance aboon the burn,

The dews begin to fa',

The pairtricks down the rushy holm,

Set up their e'ening ca'.

Now loud and clear the blackbird's sang

Rings through the briery shaw,

While flittering, gay, the swallows play
Around the castle wa'.

Beneath the golden gloamin' sky

The mavis mends her lay,

The redbreast pours his sweetest strains,
To charm the lingering day :

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While weary yeldrins seem to wail
Their little nestlings torn,

The merry wren, frae den to den,
Gaes jinking through the thorn.

The roses fauld their silken leaves,
The foxglove shuts its bell,
The honeysuckle and the birk

Spread fragrance through the dell.—

Let others crowd the giddy court
Of mirth and revelry,

The simple joys that Nature yields

Are dearer far to me.

Melancholy is the contemplation of the beginning and the end of Robert Tannahill, the popular song-writer of Paisley. Tannahill was, no doubt, stimulated by the fame of Burns. True, he had not the genius of Burns, but genius he had, and that is conspicuous in many of those songs which during his lifetime were sung with enthusiasm by his countrymen. Tannahill was a poor weaver. The cottage where he lived is still to be seen, a very ordinary weaver's cottage in an ordinary street; and the place where he drowned himself may be seen too at the outside of the town. This is one of the most dismal places in which a poet ever terininated his career. Tannahill, like Burns, was fond of a jovial hour among his comrades in a public house. But weaving of verse and weaving of calico did not agree. The world applauded, but did not patronize; poverty came like an armed man; and Tannahill, in the frenzy of despair, resolved to terminate his existence. Outside of Paisley there is a place where a small stream passes under a canal. To facilitate this passage, a

deep pit is sunk, and a channel for the waters is made under the bottom of the canal. This pit is, I believe, eighteen feet deep. It is built round with stone, which is rounded off at its mouth, so that any one falling in cannot by any possibility get out, for there is nothing to lay hold of. No doubt Tannahill in a moment of gloomy observation had noted this. At midnight he came, stripped off his coat, laid down his hat, and took the fatal plunge. No cry could reach human ear from that horrible abyss: no effort of the strongest swimmer could avail to sustain him. Thus died Robert Tannahill, and a more fearful termination was never put to a poetical career."Homes and Haunts of the most eminent British Poets; by William Howitt.

MERRIE ENGLAND.

FROM MERRIE ENGLAND IN THE OLDEN TIME," BY

GEORGE DANIEL,

O WHY was England 'merrie' called, I pray you tell me why?

Because Old England merry was in merry times gone by! She knew no dearth of honest mirth to cheer both son

and sire,

But kept it up o'er wassail cup around the Christmas fire.

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