admirers; and, as they were not few, it soon became publicly known that her flaxen locks, blue eyes, and "passing pleasing tongue" would communicate new charms to northern song. This it seems gave some offence to the more staid and stately of the Poet's friends: they remonstrated with him-not on the impropriety of resorting to the beauty of a farmer's daughter to bestow grace or tenderness on his strains, but because he had given her copies of his songs both in manuscript and print, which, in the careless gaiety of her nature, she exhibited to the world. The Poet saw that he had acted impru dently; a mutual friend was employed to reclaim the manuscripts: the lady gave them up with reluctance, but retained, and, perhaps, still retains, the work of Thomson.-ED.] No. LXIV. G. THOMSON TO BURNS. MY GOOD SIR: 15th November, 1794. SINCE receiving your last, I have had another interview with Mr. Clarke, and a long consultation. He thinks the "Caledonian Hunt is more Bacchanalian than amorous in its nature, and recommends it to you to match the air accordingly. Pray did it ever occur to you how peculiarly well the Scottish airs are adapted for verses in the form of a dialogue? The first part of the air is generally low, and suited for a man's voice, and the second part in many instances cannot be sung, at concert pitch, but by a female voice. A song, thus performed, makes an agreeable variety, but few of ours are written in this form I wish you would think of it in some of those that remain. The only one of the kind you have sent me is admirable, and will be an universal favourite. Your verses for "Rothemurche" are so sweetly pastoral, and your serenade to Chloris, for "Deil tak the Wars," so passionately tender, that I have sung myself into raptures with them. Your song for "My lodging is on the cold ground," is likewise a diamond of the first water; I am quite dazzled and delighted with it. Some of your Chlorises, I suppose, have flaxen hair, from your partiality for this colour; else we differ about it; for I should scarcely conceive a woman to be a beauty, on reading that she had lint-white locks! "Farewell thou stream that winding flows," I think excellent, but it is much too serious to come after "Nancy:" at least it would seem an incongruity to provide the same air with merry Scottish, and melancholy English verses! The more that the two sets of verses resemble each other in their general character, the better. Those you have manufactured for "Dainty Davie" will answer charmingly. I am happy to find you have begun your anecdotes: I care not how long they be, for it is impossible that any thing from your pen can be tedious. Let me beseech you not to use ceremony in telling me when you wish to present any of your friends with the songs: the next carrier will bring you three copies, and you are as welcome to twenty as to a pinch of snuff. [The anecdotes promised by the Poet were but in part written a rich treat has thus been lost to all his admirers. He would have given us a chapter on the : human heart, informed us of the various feelings and impulses under which he wrote his lyrics—the hour and the season in which they were produced-the walks in which he mused, and the heroines who lent look and life to the strains. Of each we would have known as much as we do of Highland Mary; nor could this have been otherwise than acceptable to the ladies themselves. We have been left to tradition, or conjecture, or accidental intimations; and the honour done to the charms of one has, we fear, sometimes been conferred on another. The Poet wrote notes of another kind on Johnson's Museum : these will be found in a future volume. They are at once old and new, serious and comic, full of anecdotes and scraps of quaint and curious song, and marked everywhere with that peculiar spirit and feeling which distinguished Burns amongst all the sons of Caledonia.-ED.] No. LXV. BURNS TO G. THOMSON. 19th November, 1794. You see, my dear Sir, what a punctual correspondent I am; though indeed you may thank yourself for the tedium of my letters, as you have so flattered me on my horsemanship with my favourite hobby, and have praised the grace of his ambling so much, that I am scarcely ever off his back. For instance, this morning, though a keen blowing frost, in my walk before breakfast, I finished my duet, which you were pleased to praise so much. Whether I have uniformly succeeded, I will not say; but here it is for you, though it is not an hour old: :- O PHILLY, HAPPY BE THAT DAY. Tune-" The Sow's Tail." HE. O Philly, happy be that day, When roving through the gather'd hay, SHE. O Willy, ay I bless the grove Where first I own'd my maiden love, |