y, the ancient
Bailieries of Carrick, Kyle, and Cunningham, famous both in ancient and
modern times for a gallant and warlike race of inhabitants; a country
where civil and particularly religious liberty have ever found their
first support and their last asylum, a country the birthplace of many
famous philosophers, soldiers, and statesmen, and the scene of many
important events in Scottish history, particularly a great many of the
actions of the glorious Wallace, the saviour of his country; yet we have
never had one Scottish poet of any eminence to make the fertile banks of
Irvine, the romantic woodlands and sequestered scenes of Aire, and the
heathy mountainous source and winding sweep of Doon, emulate Tay, Forth,
Ettrick, Tweed, etc. This is a complaint I would gladly remedy; but,
alas! I am far unequal to the task, both in native genius and education.
Obscure I am, and obscure I must be, though no young poet nor young
soldier's heart ever beat more fondly for fame than mine.' The same
thoughts and aspirations are echoed later in his _Epistle to William
Simpson_--

'Ramsay and famous Fergusson
Gied Forth and Tay a lift aboon;
Yarrow and Tweed, to mony a tune,
Owre Scotland rings,
While Irwin, Lugar, Ayr, and Doon,
Naebody sings.

* * * * *

We'll gar our streams and burnies shine
Up wi' the best!'

The dread of obscurity spoken of here was almost a weakness with Burns.
We hear it like an ever-recurring wail in his poems and letters. In the
very next entry in his commonplace book, after praising the old bards,
and drawing a parallel between their sources of inspiration and his own,
he shudders to think that his fate may be such as theirs. 'Oh mortifying
to a bard's vanity, their very names are buried in the wreck of things
that were!'

Close on the heels of these entries came troubles on the head of the
luckless poet, troubles more serious than bad seed and late harvests.
During the summer of 1784, we know that he was in bad health, and again
subject to melancholy. His verses at this time are of a religious cast,
serious and sombre, the confession of fault, and the cry of repentance.

'Thou know'st that Thou hast formed me
With passions wild and strong;
And listening to their witching voice
Has often led me wrong.'

Perhaps this is only the prelude to his verses to Rankine, written
tow