genius, if ever there was one. Had he been a poorer and
socially humbler man than he was--had he had his bread and his position
to make--he would probably have achieved immortality. Some of his songs
are as familiar to the world as those of Burns, though their author is
forgotten,--as, for instance, the song of parental farewell, beginning--

"Good-night, and joy be wi' ye a';
Your harmless mirth has cheered my heart,"

and ending with this fine and genial touch--

"The auld will speak, the young maun hear;
Be canty, but be good and leal;
Your ain ills aye hae heart to bear,
Another's aye hae heart to feel:
So, ere I set I'll see you shine,
I'll see you triumph ere I fa';
My parting breath shall boast you mine.
Good-night, and joy be wi' you a'."

His "Auld Gudeman, ye're a drucken carle," "Jenny's Bawbee," and "Jenny
dang the Weaver," are of another kind, and perhaps fuller of the
peculiar spirit of the man. This consisted in hitting off the deeper and
typical characteristics of Scottish life with an easy touch that brings
it all home at once. His lines do not seem as if they were composed by
an effort of talent, but as if they were the spontaneous expressions of
nature.

Take the following specimen of ludicrous pomposity, which must suffer a
little by being quoted from memory: it describes a Highland
procession:--

"Come the Grants o' Tullochgorum,
Wi' their pipers on afore 'em;
Proud the mithers are that bore 'em,
Fee fuddle, fau fum.

Come the Grants o' Rothiemurchus,
Ilka ane his sword an' durk has,
Ilka ane as proud's a Turk is,
Fee fuddle, fau fum."

To comprehend the spirit of this, one must endow himself with the
feelings of a Lowland Scot before Waverley and Rob Roy imparted a glow
of romantic interest to the Highlanders. The pompous and the ludicrous
were surely never more happily interwoven. One would require to go
further back still to appreciate the spirit of "Skeldon Haughs, or the
Sow is Flitted." It is a picture of old Ayrshire feudal rivalry and
hatred. The Laird of Bargainy resolved to humiliate his neighbour and
enemy, the Laird of Kerse, by a forcible occupation of part of his
territory. For the purpose of making this aggression flagrantly
insulting, it was done by tethering or staking a female pig on the
domain of Kerse. The animal was, of course, attended by a sufficient
body of armed men for h