DEATH AND DOCTOR HORNBOOK: A TRUE STORY. SOME books are lies frae end to end, A rousing whid, at times, to vend, And nail't wi' Scripture. But this that I am gaun to tell, Or Dublin city: That e'er he nearer comes oursel 'S a muckle pity. The Clachan yill had made me canty, An' hillocks, stanes, and bushes, kenn'd ay Frae ghaists an' witches. The rising moon began to glow'r To count her horns, wi' a' my pow'r, But whether she had three or four, I was come round about the hill, ; To keep me sicker Tho' leeward whyles, against my will, I took a bicker. I there wi' Something did forgather, An awfu' scythe, out-owre ae shouther, Clear-dangling, hang; A three-taed leister on the ither Lay, large an' lang. Its stature seem'd lang Scotch ells twa, For fient a wame it had ava; And then, its shanks, They were as thin, as sharp an' sma' As cheeks o' branks: 'Guid-een,' quo' I; 'Friend! hae ye been mawin, When ither folk are busy sawin ?* It seem'd to mak a kind o' stan', But naething spak; This rencounter happened in sced-time, 1786, At length, says I, Friend, whare ye gaun, o 'Will ye go back?' It spak right howe, My name is Death, 'But be na' fley'd'—Quoth I, 'Guid faith, 'Ye're may be come to stap my breath; 】 "But tent me billie; I red ye weel, tak care o' skaith, See, there's a gully! 'Guidman,' quo' he, put up your whittle, 'I'm no design'd to try its mettle; 'But if I did, I wad be kittle To be misleard, bor "I wad na mind it, no, that spittle • Out-owre my beard.' 'Weel, weel!' says I, a bargain be't; 'Come, gies your hand, an' sae we're gree't; 'We'll ease our shanks an' tak a seat, Come, gies your news; This while ye hae been mony a gate 'At mony a house.' Ay, ay!' quo' he, an' shook his head, "It's e'en a lang, lang time indeed Sin' I began to nick the thread, 'An' choke the breath: 'Folk maun do something for their bread, An' sae maun Death. * An epidemical fever was then raging in that country. Sax thousand years are near hand fled 'An' mony a scheme in vain's been laid, To stap or scar me; 'Till ane Hornbook's* ta'en up the trade, An' faith, he'll waur me. "Ye ken Jock Hornbook i' the Clachan, 6 The weans haud out their fingers laughin See, here's a scythe, and there's a dart, But Doctor Hornbook, wi' his art And cursed skill, Has made them baith no worth a f―t, 'Twas but yestreen, nae farther gaen, "I threw a noble throw at ane; 'Wi' less, I'm sure, I've hundred's slain; But deil-ma-care, "It just play'd dirl on the bane, 'But did nae mair. * This gentleman, Dr Hornbook, is professionally, a brother of the Sovereign Order of the Ferula, but, by intuition and inspiration, is at once an Apothecary, Surgeon, and Physician, + Buchan's Domestic Medicine, * Hornbook was by, wi' ready art, And had sae fortify'd the párt, That when I looked to my dart, It was sae blunt, • Fient haet o't wad hae pierc'd the heart T "Of a kail-runt. I drew my scythe in sic a fury, • Withstood the shock I might as weel hae try'd a quarry Ev'n them he canna get attended, • Just in a kail-blade, and send it, 'As soon he smells't, Baith their disease, and what will mend it, And then a' doctor's saws and whittles, Their Latin names as fast he rattles Calces o' fossils, earth, and trees; • He has❜t in plenty |