But yet his horse was not a whit
Inclined to tarry there;
For why?-his owner had a house
Full ten miles off, at Ware.

So like an arrow swift he flew,

Shot by an archer strong;

So did he fly-which brings me to The middle of my song.

Away went Gilpin out of breath,
And sore against his will,
Till at his friend the calender's
His horse at last stood still.

The calender, amazed to see

His neighbor in such trim,
Laid down his pipe, flew to the gate,
And thus accosted him:

"What news? what news? your tidings tell;
Tell me you must and shall-
Say why bareheaded you are come,
Or why you come at all?"

Now Gilpin had a pleasant wit,

And loved a timely joke; And thus unto the calender

In merry guise he spoke:

"I came because your horse would come; And, if I well forebode,

My hat and wig will soon be here,
They are upon the road."

The calender, right glad to find

His friend in merry pin, Returned him not a single word, But to the house went in;

Whence straight he came with hat and wig:
A wig that flowed behind,

A hat not much the worse for wear-
Each comely in its kind.

He held them up, and in his turn
Thus showed his ready wit-
"My head is twice as big as yours,
They therefore needs must fit.

"But let me scrape the dirt away
That hangs upon your face;
And stop and eat, for well you may
Be in a hungry case."

"Stop thief! stop thief!--a highwayman!"

Not one of them was mute;
And all and each that passed that way

Did join in the pursuit.

And now the turnpike gates again

Flew open in short space;
The toll-men thinking as before,
That Gilpin rode a race.

And so he did, and won it too,

For he got first to town;

Nor stopped till where he had got up

He did again get down.

Now let us sing, long live the king!
And Gilpin, long live he;

And when he next doth ride abroad,
May I be there to see!

WILLIAM COWPER.

IV.

"Coot tay to you, sir!

Are not you ta Fhairshon?
Was you coming here
To visit any person?
You are a plackguard, sir!
It is now six hundred
Coot long years, and more,

Since my glen was plundered."

V.

"Fat is tat you say?

Dar you cock your peaver? I will teach you, sir,

Fat is coot pehaviour! You shall not exist

For another day more;

I will shot you, sir,

419

TAM O'SHANTER.

A TALE.

Of Brownyis and of Bogilis full is this Buke.
Gawin Douglass.

WHEN chapman billies leave the street,
And drouthy neebors neebors meet,
As market-days are wearing late,
An' folk begin to tak the gate;
While we sit bousing at the nappy,
An' getting fou and unco happy,
We think na on the lang Scots miles,
The mosses, waters, slaps, and styles,
That lie between us and our hame,
Whare sits our sulky, sullen dame,
Gathering her brows like gathering storm,
Nursing her wrath to keep it warm.

This truth fand honest Tam o' Shanter,
As he, frae Ayr, ae night did canter,
(Auld Ayr, wham ne'er a town surpasses,
For honest men and bonnie lasses).

O Tam! hadst thou but been sae wise
As taen thy ain wife Kate's advice!
She tauld thee weel thou was a skellum,
A bleth'ring, blust'ring, drunken blellum;
That frae November till October,
Ae market-day thou was na sober;
That ilka melder, wi' the miller,
Thou sat as lang as thou had siller;
That every naig was ca'd a shoe on,
The smith and thee gat roaring fou on;
That at the L-d's house, ev'n on Sunday,
Thou drank wi Kirton Jean till Monday.
She prophesy'd that, late or soon,
Thou would be found deep drown'd in Doon;
Or catch'd wi' warlocks in the mirk,
By Alloway's auld haunted kirk.

Ah, gentle dames! it gars me greet
To think how monie counsels sweet,
How monie lengthened sage advices,
The husband frae the wife despises!

But to our tale: Ae market night
Tam had got planted unco right,
Fast by an ingle, bleezing finely,
Wi' reaming swats, that drank divinely;
And at his elbow souter Johnny,
His ancient, trusty, drouthy crony-
Tam lo'ed him like a vera brither-
They had been fou for weeks thegither.

The night drave on wi' sangs and clatter;
And ay the ale was growing better.
The landlady and Tam grew gracious,
Wi' favours secret, sweet, and precious;
The souter tauld his queerest stories;
The landlord's laugh was ready chorus;
The storm without might rair and rustle,
Tam did na mind the storm a whistle.

Care, mad to see a man sae happy,
E'en drowned himself amang the nappy;
As bees flee hame wi' lades o' treasure,
The minutes winged their way wi' pleasure;
Kings may be blest, but Tam was glorious,
O'er a' the ills o' life victorious.

But pleasures are like poppies spread,
You seize the flower, its bloom is shed;
Or like the snow-fall in the river,
A moment white-then melts for ever;
Or like the borealis race,

That flit ere you can point their place;
Or like the rainbow's lovely form
Evanishing amid the storm.

Nae man can tether time or tide;

The hour approaches Tam maun ride-
That hour o' night's black arch the key-

stane,

That dreary hour he mounts his beast in;
And sic a night he takes the road in
As ne'er poor sinner was abroad in.

The wind blew as 'twad blawn its last;
The rattling showers rose on the blast;
The speedy gleams the darkness swallowed;
Loud, deep, and lang, the thunder bellowed;
That night a child might understand
The Deil had business on his hand.

Weel mounted on his grey mare, Meg, (A better never lifted leg),

Tam skelpit on thro' dub and mire,
Despising wind, and rain, and fire-
Whyles holding fast his guid blue bonnet,
Whyles crooning o'er some auld Scots sonnet,
Whyles glow'ring round wi' prudent cares,
Lest bogles catch him unawares;
Kirk-Alloway was drawing nigh,
Where ghaists and houlets nightly cry.

By this time he was cross the ford, Whare in the snaw the chapman smoored; And past the birks and meikle stane, Whare drunken Charlie brak 's neck bane; And thro' the whins, and by the cairn, Whare hunters fand the murdered bairn;

And near the thorn, aboon the well,
Whare Mungo's mither hang'd hersel.
Before him Doon pours all his floods:
The doubling storm roars thro' the woods;
The lightnings flash from pole to pole;
Near and more near the thunders roll;
When glimmering thro' the groaning trees,
Kirk-Alloway seem'd in a bleeze;

Thro' ilka bore the beams were glancing,
And loud resounded mirth and dancing.
Inspiring bold John Barleycorn!
What dangers thou canst make us scorn!
Wi' tippenny we fear nae evil;
Wi' usquabae we 'll face the Devil!-
The swats sae ream'd in Tammie's
dle,

Wi' mair o' horrible and awfu',

Which ev'n to name wad be unlawfu'.

421

Fair play, he car'd na Deils a bodle.
But Maggie stood right sair astonish'd,
Till, by the heel and hand admonish'd,
She ventured forward on the light;
And, wow! Tam saw an unco sight—
Warlocks and witches in a dance:
Nae cotillion brent new frae France,
But hornpipes, jigs, strathspeys, and reels
Put life and mettle in their heels.
A winnock-bunker in the east,
There sat auld Nick, in shape o' beast-
A towzie tyke, black, grim, and large—
To gie them music was his charge;
He screw'd the pipes and gart them skirl,
Till roof an' rafters a' did dirl.
Coffins stood round like open presses,
That shaw'd the dead in their last dresses;
And by some devilish cantrips sleight,
Each in its cauld hand held a light-
By which heroic Tam was able
To note upon the haly table,

A murderer's banes in gibbet airns;
Twa span-lang, wee, unchristen'd bairns;
A thief, new cutted fra a rape,
Wi' his last gasp his gab did gape;
Five tomahawks, wi' bluid red rusted;
Five scymitars, wi' murder crusted;
A garter which a babe had strangled;
A knife a father's throat had mangled,
Whom his ain son o' life bereft-
The grey hairs yet stack to the heft;
Three lawyers' tongues turn'd inside out,
Wi' lies seam'd like a beggar's clout;
And priests' hearts, rotten, black as muck,
Lay stinking, vile, in every neuk:

That ance were plush, o' guid blue hair,
I wad hae gi'en them aff my hurdies,
For ae blink o' the bonnie burdies!

But withered beldams, auld and droll,
Rigwoodie hags wad spean a foal,
Lowping an' flinging on a crummock-
I wonder did na turn thy stomach.

But Tam kenn'd what was what fu' brawlie. There was ae winsome wench and walie, That night inlisted in the core, (Lang after kenn'd on Carrick shore! For monie a beast to dead she shot, And perish'd monie a bonnie boat, And shook baith meikle corn and bear, And kept the country-side in fear), Her cutty-sark o' Paisley harn, That while a lassie she had wornIn longitude tho' sorely scanty, It was her best, and she was vauntie. Ah! little kenn'd thy reverend grannie That sark she coft for her wee Nannie, Wi' twa pund Scots (twas a' her riches)— Wad ever grac'd a dance o' witches!

But here my Muse her wing maun cow'r, Sic flights are far beyond her pow'r; To sing how Nannie lap and flang, (A souple jad she was and strang); And how Tam stood, like ane bewitch'd, And thought his very een enrich'd. Ev'n Satan glowr'd, and fidg'd fu' fain, And hotch'd and blew wi' might and main; Till first ae caper, syne anitherTam tint his reason a' thegither, And roars out, Weel done, Cutty-sark! And in an instant a' was dark;

And scarcely had he Maggie rallied,
When out the hellish legion sallied.

As bees bizz out wi' angry fyke,
When plundering herds assail their byke;
As open pussie's mortal foes,

When pop! she starts before their nose;
As eager runs the market-crowd,
When Catch the thief! resounds aloud;
So Maggie runs-the witches follow,

Wi' monie an eldritch skreech and hollow. Ah, Tam! ah, Tam! thou'll get thy fairin'!

In hell they'll roast thee like a herrin!
In vain thy Kate awaits thy comin'-
Kate soon will be a woefu' woman!
Now, do thy speedy utmost, Meg,
And win the key-stane of the brig;
There at them thou thy tail may toss-
A running stream they dare na cross.
But ere the key-stane she could make,
The fient a tail she had to shake;
For Nannie, far before the rest,
Hard upon noble Maggie prest,
And flew at Tam wi' furious ettle;
But little wist she Maggie's mettle-
Ae spring brought aff her master hale,
But left behind her ain grey tail:
The carlin claught her by the rump,
And left poor Maggie scarce a stump.
Now, wha this tale o' truth shall read,
Ilk man and mother's son take heed;
Whene'er to drink you are inclined,
Or cutty-sarks run in your mind,
Think, ye may buy the joys o'er dear,
Remember Tam o' Shanter's mare.

COLOGNE.

ROBERT BURNS.

IN Köln, a town of monks and bones,
And pavements fanged with murderous stones,
And rags, and hags, and hideous wenches
I counted two and seventy stenches,
All well defined and several stinks!

Ye Nymphs that reign o'er sewers and sinks,
The river Rhine, it is well known,
Doth wash your city of Cologne;
But tell me, Nymphs! what power divine
Shall henceforth wash the river Rhine?
SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE.

THE DEVIL'S THOUGHTS.

I.

FROM his brimstone bed at break of day A walking the Devil is gone,

To visit his snug little farm, the Earth, And see how his stock goes on.

II.

Over the hill and over the dale,
And he went over the plain;
And backward and forward he switched his
long tail,

As a gentleman switches his cane.

III.

And how then was the Devil drest?
Of he was in his Sunday's best:

His jacket was red and his breeches were blue,

And there was a hole where the tail came through.

IV.

He saw a lawyer killing a viper

On a dunghill, hard by his own stable; And the Devil smiled, for it put him in mind Of Cain and his brother Abel.

V.

He saw an Apothecary on a white horse Ride by on his vocations;

And the Devil thought of his old friend Death, in the Revelations.

VI.

He saw a cottage with a double coach-house, A cottage of gentility;

And the Devil did grin, for his darling sin Is pride that apes humility.

VII.

He peeped into a rich bookseller's shopQuoth he, "We are both of one college! For I sate, myself, like a cormorant, once, Hard by the tree of knowledge."

VIII.

Down the river did glide, with wind and with tide,

A pig with vast celerity;