VERSES

WRITTEN ON A WINDOW OF THE INN AT CARRON

WE cam 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 tirled at your door,

Your porter dought na hear us;
Sae may, should we to hell's yetts come,
Your billy Satan sair us!

EPITAPH

ON A CELEBRATED RULING ELDER.

HERE Souter **** in death does sleep;
To h-ll, if he's gane thither,
Satan, gie him thy gear to keep!

He'll haud it weel thegither.

ON A NOISY POLEMIC.

BELOW thir stanes lie Jamie's banes:
O Death! it's my opinion,

Thou ne'er took such a bleth'rin' b-tch
Into thy dark dominion!

ON WEE JOHNNY

Hic jacet wee Johnnie.

WHOE'ER thou art, O reader, know
That Death has murder'd Johnny!
An' here his body lies fu' low-
For saul, he ne'er had ony.

FOR G. H., ESQ.

THE poor man weeps here G―n sleeps,

Whom canting wretches blam'd:

But with such as he, where'er he be,

May I be sav'd or damn'd!

ON A WAG IN MAUCHLINE.

LAMENT him, Mauchline husbands a',
He aften did assist ye:

For had ye staid whole weeks awa',
Your wives, they ne'er had miss'd ye.

Ye Mauchline bairns, as on ye pass
To school in bands thegither,
O tread ye lightly on the grass, -
Perhaps he was your father'

ON JOHN DOVE,

INN-KEEPER, MAUCHLINE.

HERE lies Johnny Pidgeon;
What was his religion,
Whae'er desires to ken,

To some other warl'

Maun follow the carl,

For here Johnny Pidgeon had nane.

Strong ale was ablution,

Small beer persecution,

A dram was memento mori;

But a full flowing bowl

Was the saving his soul,
And Port was celestial glory.

"In his flesh there's a famine,"
A starv'd reptile cries;
"And his heart is rank poison,"
Another replies.

ON A HENPECKED COUNTRY SQUIRE

As father Adam first was fool'd,
A case that's still too common,
Here lies a man a woman rul'd-
The Devil rul'd the woman'

EPIGRAM ON SAID OCCASION.

O DEATH! hadst thou but spar'd his life,
Whom we this day lament!

We freely wad exchang'd the wife,

And a' been weel content.

Ev'n as he is, cauld in his graff,
The swap we yet will do't;
Tak thou the Carlin's carcass aff,
Thou'se get the saul o' boot!

ANOTHER.

ONE Queen Artemisa, 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 pow

der.

But Queen N****** of a diff'rent complexion,
When call'd on to order the .fun'ral direction,

Would have eat her dead lord, on a slender pre

ON THE DEATH OF A LAP-DOG NAMED ECHO,

IN wood and wild, ye warbling throng,

Your heavy loss deplore;

Now half extinct your pow'rs of song,
Sweet Echo is no more!