Contents -BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD

Robert Burns (1759–1796). Poems and Songs.
The Harvard Classics. 1909–14.

258 . Epistle to James Tennant of Glenconner

AULD comrade dear, and brither sinner,

How’s a’ the folk about Glenconner?

How do you this blae eastlin wind,

That’s like to blaw a body blind?

For me, my faculties are frozen,

My dearest member nearly dozen’d.

I’ve sent you here, by Johnie Simson,

Twa sage philosophers to glimpse on;

Smith, wi’ his sympathetic feeling,

An’ Reid, to common sense appealing.

Philosophers have fought and wrangled,

An’ meikle Greek an’ Latin mangled,

Till wi’ their logic-jargon tir’d,

And in the depth of science mir’d,

To common sense they now appeal,

What wives and wabsters see and feel.

But, hark ye, friend! I charge you strictly,

Peruse them, an’ return them quickly:

For now I’m grown sae cursed douce

I pray and ponder butt the house;

My shins, my lane, I there sit roastin’,

Perusing Bunyan, Brown, an’ Boston,

Till by an’ by, if I haud on,

I’ll grunt a real gospel-groan:

Already I begin to try it,

To cast my e’en up like a pyet,

When by the gun she tumbles o’er

Flutt’ring an’ gasping in her gore:

Sae shortly you shall see me bright,

A burning an’ a shining light.

My heart-warm love to guid auld Glen,

The ace an’ wale of honest men:

When bending down wi’ auld grey hairs

Beneath the load of years and cares,

May He who made him still support him,

An’ views beyond the grave comfort him;

His worthy fam’ly far and near,

God bless them a’ wi’ grace and gear!

My auld schoolfellow, Preacher Willie,

The manly tar, my mason-billie,

And Auchenbay, I wish him joy,

If he’s a parent, lass or boy,

May he be dad, and Meg the mither,

Just five-and-forty years thegither!

And no forgetting wabster Charlie,

I’m tauld he offers very fairly.

An’ Lord, remember singing Sannock,

Wi’ hale breeks, saxpence, an’ a bannock!

And next, my auld acquaintance, Nancy,

Since she is fitted to her fancy,

An’ her kind stars hae airted till her

gA guid chiel wi’ a pickle siller.

My kindest, best respects, I sen’ it,

To cousin Kate, an’ sister Janet:

Tell them, frae me, wi’ chiels be cautious,

For, faith, they’ll aiblins fin’ them fashious;

To grant a heart is fairly civil,

But to grant a maidenhead’s the devil.

An’ lastly, Jamie, for yoursel,

May guardian angels tak a spell,

An’ steer you seven miles south o’ hell:

But first, before you see heaven’s glory,

May ye get mony a merry story,

Mony a laugh, and mony a drink,

And aye eneugh o’ needfu’ clink.

Now fare ye weel, an’ joy be wi’ you:

For my sake, this I beg it o’ you,

Assist poor Simson a’ ye can,

Ye’ll fin; him just an honest man;

Sae I conclude, and quat my chanter,

Your’s, saint or sinner,