"O ye, whose cheek the tear of pity stains, 'For even his failings leaned to virtue's side!'"' Many years ago when the late Colonel Robert G. Ingersoll visited the cottage birth-place of Burns, he sat in the poet's chair and impulsively composed the following tribute to the Scotch Bard, which is displayed on the walls of the building today: BURNS. Though Scotland boasts a thousand names The noblest, grandest of them all Was loved and cradled here. Here lived the gentle, peasant prince, Compared with whom the greatest lord 'Tis but a cot roofed in with straw, A hovel made of clay; One door shuts out the snow and storm And yet I stand within this room For here beneath this lowly thatch Within this hallowed hut I feel And here the world through all the years, As long as day returns, The tribute of its love and tears DUMFRIES SOCIABILITY. SONG COMPOSITION. DECAY AND DEATH. The move of Burns from his farm to the enticing haunts of Dumfries threw him into a set of day and night associates, who used his talking and acting genius for their selfish amuse ments. He was a willing victim for their applause at every banquet board and seemed delighted when playing the "monkey" to their whirling circus of dance and song. The mind and body of Burns mingled naturally with the scenes and environments of the lowly, and although his soul-lit muse would occasionally rise from the clods of the valley into the sunshine of graceful intellectuality, his battered wings would be often trailed in the gutter of sensuous degradation. Singing, dancing and drinking among the peasantry in the age in which Burns lived was as common and open as the brooks and rivers of Caledonia; and even the so-called gentry thought it the height of excellence and manhood to drink their companions under the table! And thus Burns, catching the spirit of the times, exclaims: "John Barleycorn was a hero bold, Of noble enterprise, For if you do but taste his blood, 'Twill make a man forget his woe, "Twill make the widow's heart to sing Then let us toast John Barleycorn, And may his great posterity In the summer of 1793, Burns and Mr. Syme of the Excise Board made an excursion into the wild region of Galloway, and visited St. Mary's Isle, the romantic home of the Earl of Selkirk. It was on this trip that he composed his great war song, "Scots Who Have for Wallace Bled," inspired by the patriotic recollection of Bruce and the Battle of Bannockburn. He remained all night at the castle of the old Earl, and delighted the daughters of his host by reciting and singing his own songs, assisted by the great Italian musician, Urbani. Burns could be very agreeable when the mood of hope, love and ambition prevailed, forgetting in the glory of the muses the misery of his worldly situation, giving pleasure to all who came under the spell of his magnetic nature. It was a great pity, and a great mistake, of the British government, in allowing this glorious child of song to be tortured daily in mind and body, as to how and where to get the necessaries of life for himself and family. Thousands of royal pets were on the civil pension list, who never could give to the honor of old Albion what this Scotch genius did in his songs and poetic philosophy; and just because Burns loved liberty, equality and justice, Dundas, Pitt and King George, tyrant Tories, allowed this great son of Democracy to pine in poverty and die in nameless laceration of soul and body! When not engaged in traveling and gauging whiskey, Burns took pleasure in composing songs for Thompson's Museum of Music, and in a letter to this gentleman he gives this manner and habit of composition: "My way is—I consider the poetic sentiment corresponding to my idea of the musical expression, then choose my theme, begin one stanza; when that is composed, which is generally the most difficult part of the business, I walk out, sit down now and then, look out for objects in nature around me that are in unison and harmony with the cogitations of my fancy and workings of my bosom; humming every now and then the air with the verses I have framed. When I feel When I feel my Muse beginning to jade, I retire to the solitary fireside of my study and there commit my effusions to paper, swinging at intervals on the hind legs of my elbow chair, by way of calling forth my own critical strictures as my pen goes on." Allan Cunningham says, Burns had three favorite musing walks along the banks of Nith, where he could be secluded, and look over the distant hills and romantic towers of Lincluden Castle, listening to the rush of the river, as in twilight, autumn hours, he spun silver threads of song that still vibrate through the hearts of mankind. When Burns returned to his cot, after these twilight compositions, he repeated them to his beautiful and faithful wife, who would sing over the words and tunes he dictated, aiding him in perfecting the mystic melodies of his fevered brain. Burns says, when he wished to compose a love song, he put himself upon a diet of "admiring a beautiful woman!" He must have been in that mood when he composed the serenade to MARY MORISON. O Mary, at thy window be, It is the wished, the trysted hour! Those smiles and glances let me see, Last evening when to trembling string The dance tripped through the lighted hall, I sat, but neither heard nor saw; I sighed, and said among them all,— O Mary, canst thou wreck his peace, Burns not only had a ready knack of composing love songs, but his patriotic soul divined the sentiment of the heroic soldier, wounded and dying on the battlefield.— SONG OF DEATH. "Farewell, thou fair day, thou green earth and ye skies, Now gay with the bright setting sun! Farewell, loves and friendships, ye dear tender ties, Our race of existence is run! Thou grim king of terrors, thou life's gloomy foe, |