Tune--" LOGAN WATER,J

O LOGAN, Sweetly didst thou glide,
That day I was my Willie's bride;
And years sinsyne hae o'er us run,
Like Logan to the simmer sun.
But now thy flow'ry banks appear
Like drumlie winter, dark and drear,
While my dear lad maun face his faes,
Far, far frae me and Logan braes.

Again the merry month o' May
Has made our hills and valleys gay;
The birds rejoice in leafy bowers,

The bees hum round the breathing flowers:
Blithe, morning lifts his rosy eye,
And evening's tears are tears of joy:
My soul, delightless, a' surveys,
While Willie's far frae Logan braes.

Within yon milk-white hawthorn bush,
Amang her nestlings sits the thrush;
Her faithfu' mate will share her toil,
Or wi' his songs her cares beguile:
But I wi' my sweet nurslings here,
Nae mate to help, nae mate to cheer,
Pass widow'd nights and joyless days,
While Willie's far frae Logan braes.

O, wae upon you, men o' state,
That brethren rouse to deadly hate!

As ye make many a fond heart mourn,
heads return!

Sae may it on your

How can your flinty hearts enjoy

?*

The widows tear, the orphans cry?

But soon may peace bring happy days,
And Willie hame to Logan braes!

Do you know the following beautiful little fragment in Witherspoon's Collection of Scots Songs?

Air" HUGHIE GRAHAM."

"O gin my love were yon red rose, That grows upon the castle wa';

And I mysel' a drap o' dew,

Into her bonnie breast to fa'!

"Oh! there, beyond expression blest,
I'd feast on beauty a' the night;
Seal'd on her silk-saft faulds to rest,
Till fley'd awa by Phoebus' light."

This thought is inexpressibly beautiful; and quite, so far as I know, original. It is too short for a song, else I would forswear you altogether, unless you gave it a place. I have often tried to eke a stanza to it, but in vain. After balancing myself for a musing five minutes, on the hind-legs of my elbowchair, I produced the following.

The verses are far inferior to the foregoing, I

Originally,

"Ye mind na, 'mid your cruel joys,

The widow's tears, the orphan's cries."

E.

frankly confess; but if worthy of insertion at all, they might be first in place; as every poet, who knows any thing of his trade, will husband his best thoughts for a cóncluding stroke.

O, were my love yon lilach fair,
Wi' purple blossoms to the spring;
And I, a bird to shelter there,

When wearied on my little wing.

How I wad mourn, when it was torn
By autumn wild, and winter rude!
But I wad sing on wanton wing,
When youthfu' May its bloom renew'd.

No. XXVI.

MR. THOMSON to MR BURNS..

Monday, 1st July, 1793.

I AM extremely sorry, my good Sir, that any thing should happen to unhinge you. The times are terribly out of tune; and when harmony will be restored, Heaven knows..

The first book of songs, just published, will be dispatched to you along with this. Let me be favoured with your opinion of it frankly and freely.

I shall certainly give a place to the song you have written for the Quaker's Wife; it is quite enchanting. Pray will you return the list of songs with such airs added to it as you think ought to be in

cluded. The business now rests entirely on myself, the gentlemen who originally agreed to join the speculation having requested to be off. No matter, a loser I cannot be. The superior excellence of the work will create a general demand for it as soon as it is properly known. And were the sale even slower than it promises to be, I should be somewhat compensated for my labour, by the pleasure I shall receive from the music. I cannot express how much I am obliged to you for the exquisite new songs you are sending me; but thanks, my friend, are a poor return for what you have done: as I shall be benefited by the publication, you must suffer me to inclose a small mark of my gratitude,* and to repeat it afterwards when I find it convenient.

Do not return it, for, by Heaven, if you do, our correspondence is at an end: and though this would be no loss to you, it would mar the publication, which under your auspices cannot fail to be respectable and interesting.

Wednesday Morning.

I THANK you for your delicate additional verses to the old fragment, and for your excellent song to Logan Water; Thomson's truly elegant one will follow, for the English singer. Your apostrophe to statesmen is admirable; but I am not sure if it is quite suitable to the supposed gentle character of the fair mourner who speaks it.

£5.

No. XXVII

MR BURNS to MR THOMSON.

MY DEAR SIR,

July 2d, 1793.

I HAVE just finished the following ballad, and, as I do think it in my best style, I send it you. Mr Clarke, who wrote down the air from Mrs Burns' wood-note wild, is very fond of it, and has given it a celebrity, by teaching it to some young ladies of the first fashion here. If you do not like the air enough to give it a place in your collection, please return it. The song you may keep, as I remember it.

THERE was a lass, and she was fair,
At kirk and market to be seen;
When a' the fairest maids were met,
The fairest maid was bonnie Jean.

And ay she wrought her mammie's wark,
And ay she sang sae merrilie :

The blithest bird upon the bush
Had ne'er a lighter heart than she.

But hawks will rob the tender joys,
That bless the little lintwhite's nest;
And frost will blight the fairest flowers;
And love will break the soundest rest.

Young Robie was the brawest lad,

The flower and pride of a' the glen;