Thomas Humphry Ward, ed. The English Poets. 1880–1918.rnVol. III. The Eighteenth Century: Addison to Blake
Robert Burns (17591796)Extract from An Epistle to John Lapraik, an Old Scottish Bard
I
But just a Rhymer like, by chance,
An’ hae to learning nae pretence,
Yet, what the matter?
Whene’er my Muse does on me glance,
I jingle at her.
And say, ‘How can you e’er propose,
You wha ken hardly verse frae prose,
To mak a sang?’
But, by your leaves, my learned foes,
Ye ’re maybe wrang.
Your Latin names for horns an’ stools;
If honest nature made you fools,
What sairs your grammars?
Ye ’d better taen up spades and shools,
Or knappin-hammers.
Confuse their brains in college classes!
They gang in stirks, and come out asses,
Plain truth to speak;
An’ syne they think to climb Parnassus
By dint o’ Greek!
That ’s a’ the learning I desire;
Then tho’ I drudge thro’ dub an’ mire
At pleugh or cart,
My Muse, though hamely in attire,
May touch the heart.
Or Fergusson’s, the bauld and slee,
Or bright Lapraik’s, my friend to be,
If I can hit it!
That would be lear eneugh for me,
If I could get it.