No. XXXIX. BURNS TO G. THOMSON. Sept. 1793. You may readily trust, my dear Sir, that any exertion in my power is heartily at your service. But one thing I must hint to you; the very name of Peter Pindar is of great service to your publication, so get a verse from him now and then though I have no objection, as well as I can, to bear the burden of the business. You know that my pretensions to musical taste are merely a few of nature's instincts, untaught and untutored by art. For this reason, many musical compositions, particularly where much of the merit lies in counterpoint, however they may transport and ravish the ears of you connoisseurs, affect my simple lug no otherwise than merely as melodious din. On the other hand, by way of amends, I am delighted with many little melodies, which the learned musician despises as silly and insipid. I do not know whether the old air "Hey, tuttie taitie,' may rank among this number; but well I know that, with Fraser's hautboy, it has often filled my eyes with tears. There is a tradition, which I have met with in many places of Scotland, that it was Robert Bruce's march at the battle of Bannock-burn. This thought, in my solitary wanderings, warmed me to a pitch of enthusiasm on the theme of liberty and independence, which I threw into a kind of Scottish ode, fitted to the air, that one might suppose to be the gallant Royal Scot's address to his heroic followers on that eventful morning. BRUCE TO HIS MEN AT BANNOCKBURN. Tune-"Hey, tuttie taitie.” I. Scots, wha hae wi' Wallace bled, Or to victorie! II. Now's the day, and now's the hour; See approach proud Edward's pow'r— III. Wha will be a traitor-knave ? Let him turn and flee! IV. Wha for Scotland's king and law Freeman stand or freeman fa'? Let him follow me! V. By oppression's woes and pains! VI. Lay the proud usurpers low! So may God ever defend the cause of truth and liberty, as he did that day!—Amen. P. S. I showed the air to Urbani, who was highly pleased with it, and begged me to make soft verses for it, but I had no idea of giving myself any trouble on the subject, till the accidental recollection of that glorious struggle for freedom, associated with the glowing ideas of some other struggles of the same nature, not quite so ancient, roused my rhyming mania. Clarke's set of the tune, with his bass, you will find in the Museum; though I am afraid that the air is not what will entitle it to a place in your elegant selection. [It is related by Syme of Ryedale, that Burns composed this noble song under the influence of a storm of rain and lightning among the wilds of Glenken in Galloway. When "the rain and the whirlwind came abroad," the Poet regarded them not: he neither drew his hat over his brow, nor urged his pony onward, but seemed lost in thought. The fruit of this silence was the "Scots wha hae wi' Wallace bled;" an extraordinary song produced in an extraordinary manner. His own account of its composition has nothing of the romantic in it: yet even the poetic description of Syme cannot be considered so interesting as the following letter containing Burns' own opinion of this favourite war song.-"I am indebted," says my friend, Robert Chambers, "to Mr. Stewart of Dalguise, for this very interesting document addressed to an officer of a fencible regiment, and dated Dumfries, 5th December, 1793: it is, perhaps, one of the most characteristic letters Burns ever wrote: "Sir,-Heated as I was with wine yesternight, I was perhaps, rather seemingly impertinent in my anxious wish to be honoured with your acquaintance. You will forgive it it was the impulse of heartfelt respect. 'He is the father of the Scotch County Reform, and is a man who does honour to the business, at the same time that the business does honour to him,' said my worthy friend Glenriddell to somebody by me who was talking of your coming to this country with your corps. Then I replied I have a woman's longing to take him by the hand and say to him- Sir, I honour you as a man to whom the interests of humanity are dear, and as a patriot to whom the rights of your country are sacred.' "In times like these, Sir, when our commoners are barely able by the glimmer of their own twilight-understandings to scrawl a frank, and when lords are what gentlemen would be ashamed to be, to whom shall a sinking country call for help? To the independent country gentleman! To him who has too deep a stake in his country not to be in earnest for her welfare: and who in the honest pride of man can view with equal contempt the insolence of office and the allurements of corruption. Ac "I mentioned to you a Scots ode, or 'song, I had lately composed, and which, I think, has some merit. Allow me to enclose it. When I fall in with you at the theatre, I shall be glad to have your opinion of it. cept of it, Sir, as a very humble, but most sincere tribute of respect from a man who, dear as he prizes poetic fame, yet holds dearer an independent mind. I have the honour to be, &c. ROBERT BURNS." Something of the spirit of this far-famed song is visible in memoranda, made by Burns on visiting the field of battle in August, 1787.-" Dine at Auchenbowie: Mr. Monro an excellent worthy old man: Miss Monro an amiable, sensible, sweet young woman. Come on to Bannockburn. Shewn the old house where James III. finished so tragically his unfortunate life. The field of Bannockburn: the hole in the stone where glorious Bruce set his standard. Here no Scot can pass uninterested. I fancy to myself that I see my gallant heroic countrymen coming o'er the hill and down upon the plunderers of their country and the murderers of their fathers noble revenge and just hate glowing in every vein, striding more and more eagerly as they approach the oppressive, insulting blood-thirsty foe! I see them meet in gloriously-triumphant congratulation on the victorious field, exulting in their heroic leader, and rescued liberty and independence!" After the prose of this passage the poetry of the ode might be expected.-ED.] |