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My sister fair, quoth she, have me excused,
This diet rude and I can neer accord;

With tender meat my stomach still is us❜d-
For why, I fare as well as any lord:

Thir withir'd nuts and pease, or they be bored,

Will break my chaffs, and mak my teeth full slender, Which have been us'd before to meat more tender.

The rest of the story and the catastrophe are well known; the invitation of the city mouse, its acceptance, their perilous journey to town, their delicious meal, and its fearful interruption by Hunter Gib, (the jolly cat,) the pangs of the rural mouse, whose heart is almost frightened out of its little velvet tenement, her marvellous escape, and the delight with which she again finds herself in her warm nest in the country, are described with great felicity of humour. No one who has witnessed the ingenuity of the torment inflicted by a cat on its victim, will fail to recognize the perfect nature of Hunter Gib's' conduct, when the unfortunate rural citizen is under his clutches:

From foot to foot he cast her to and frae,

Whiles up, whiles down, as tait1 as ony kid,
Wiles would he let her run beneath the strae2,
Whiles would he wink and play with her bubhid3:
Thus to the silly mous great harm he did,

Till at the last, thro fortune fair and hap,
Betwixt the dresser and the wall she crap

Syne up in haste beside the panaling

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Sae high she clam 5, that Gibby might not get her,
And by the cleeks sae craftily gan hing

Till he was gane7; her cheer was all the better;
Syne doun she lap when there was nane to let her.
Then on the burgess mouse aloud did cry,
Sister, farewell, thy feast I here defy.

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Pinkerton has declared that this is the only fable of Henryson's worthy of preservation; a clear proof that he had little feeling for true poetry. The Lion and the Mous' completely refutes his tasteless criticism. It commences with that sweet picture of the rural delights of the leafy-month June, which we have already quoted; and, besides the truth and spirit with which the story is given, is curious, from its evident allusion to that treasonable combination of the nobles, which cost James III. his crown and his life :—

Thir cruel men that stentit has the net1,
In which the lion suddenly was tane,
Waited allway that they amends might get

For hurt men write with steel in marble stane.
Mair till expone as now I let alane;

But king and lord may well wote what I mean,
The figure hereof aftymes has been seen.

When this was said, quoth Easop, My fair child,
Persuade the Kirkmen eyedentlie to pray
That treason fra this cuntrie be exil'd;

That justice ring and nobles keep their fay
Unto their sovereign lord baith night and day:
And with that word he vanish'd, and I woke,
Sine thro the schaw hameward my journey toke.

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WILLIAM DUNBAR.

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Or this great genius, who has enriched the poetry of his country with a strain of versification superior in power, originality, and sweetness to any of his predecessors, we have to repeat, alas! the same story of unavailing regret, that little is known; and that little, founded on very imperfect evidence. Pinkerton, relying upon a stanza in Kennedy's Flyting (or Railing) against Dunbar,' conjectures that he was born at Salton, a village on the delightful coast of the Forth, in East Lothian; but, unfortunately, the acuteness of a future antiquary discovered that the truc reading of the passage was Mount Falcon; a circumstance which gave rise to a new hypothesis, equally vague and unsatisfactory. It seems not improbable, however, that he first saw the light somewhere in Lothian, about the year 1465; and from his own works, a few circumstances may be gleaned, which illustrate his individual history.

He was educated for the church; and, undoubtedly, travelled over England and a part of the Continent, as a noviciate of the order of St. Francis. This is evident from his satirical poem, entitled The Visitation of St. Francis.' The

saint appears to the poet in a vision, shortly before the dawn, and holding in his hand the habit of his order, commands him to renounce the world and become his servant. Dunbar excuses himself, observing, that he has read of many bishops, but exceeding few friars, who had been admitted to the honour of canonization; but he allows that, in his early years, he had worn the habit :

Gif ever my fortoun' wes to be a frier,

The date thereof is past full mony a year;
For into every lusty town and place

Of all Ingland, fro Berwick to Cales,

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I haif into thy habit maid gude cheir".
In freiris weid full sairly haif I fleichit";
In it haif I in pulpit gone and prechit;
In Derneton Kirk and eke in Canterbury;
In it I past at Dover oure the ferry,
Thro Picardy, and there the pepil teichet.
As lang as I did bear the freiris style,

In me, God wit, wes mony wink and wile;
In me wes falset with ilk wight to flatter,

Whilk might be flemit 6 with na haly water;
I wes ay reddy all men to beguile *.

Where he received his education it is impossible to discover; but from the colophon of one of his poems, it is presumable that he had studied at Oxford; and we may conclude from his address

To the Lordes of the King's Chekkar,' that he was in the receipt of an annual pension which was scarcely sufficient to supply his ordinary wants. 'Ye need not,' says he to these grave personages, earnestly.

1 fortune.

5 entreated.

2 friar.
* Poems, vol. i. p. 28.

8 cheer.
6 washed away.

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'spend your time or tire your thumbs, or consume your ink and paper in the reckoning up my rents or annuities. It is a short story: I got a sum of money from my lord-treasurer, which is all gone. Is not that a sad enough tale without more labour?'

My Lordis of Chacker, pleis yow to heir
My compt, I sall it mak yow cleir
But ony circumstance or sonyie1;
For left is neither cors nor cunyie
Of all that I tuik in the yeir.

For rekkyning of my rentis and roumes
Ye need not for to tyre your thowmes;
Na for to gar your countaris clink,
Nor paper for to spend nor ink
In the ressaving of my soumes*.

I tuik fra my Lord Thesaurair
Ane soume of money for to wair;

I can nocht tell yow how it is spendit,
But weill I wat that it is endit:
And that methink ane compt our sair 5.
I trowit in time whain that I tuik it
That lang in burgh I suld haif bruikit,
Now the remaines are eith to turss:
I haiff no preif heir but my purss,
Quhilk wald noch lie an it war lukit.

Even when thrown into a modern dress, the spirit does not wholly evaporate:

My Lords of Chequer, please you hear
My compt-the which I'll make full clear
Sans circumstance or theft;

Nor cross nor copper is there left
Of all I had within the year.

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