nd the poet used to
get "unco fou," while praising "inspiring bold John Barley-corn." Indeed,
in the words of the poor Scotch carpenter, met by Washington Irving at
Kirk Alloway, "it seems as if the country had grown more beautiful since
Burns had written his bonnie little songs about it."

HIS CAREER.--The poet's career was sad. Gifted but poor, and doomed to
hard work, he was given a place in the excise. He went to Edinburgh, and
for a while was a great social lion; but he acquired a horrid thirst for
drink, which shortened his life. He died in Dumfries, at the early age of
thirty-seven. His allusions to his excesses are frequent, and many of them
touching. In his praise of _Scotch Drink_ he sings _con amore_. In a
letter to Mr. Ainslie, he epitomizes his failing: "Can you, amid the
horrors of penitence, regret, headache, nausea, and all the rest of the
hounds of hell that beset a poor wretch who has been guilty of the sin of
drunkenness,--can you speak peace to a troubled soul."

Burns was a great letter-writer, and thought he excelled in that art; but,
valuable as his letters are, in presenting certain phases of his literary
and personal character, they display none of the power of his poetry, and
would not alone have raised him to eminence. They are in vigorous and
somewhat pedantic English; while most of his poems are in that Lowland
Scottish language or dialect which attracts by its homeliness and pleases
by its _couleur locale_. It should be stated, in conclusion, that Burns is
original in thought and presentation; and to this gift must be added a
large share of humor, and an intense patriotism. Poverty was his grim
horror. He declared that it killed his father, and was pursuing him to the
grave. He rose above the drudgery of a farmer's toil, and he found no
other work which would sustain him; and yet this needy poet stands to-day
among the most distinguished Scotchmen who have contributed to English
Literature.

GEORGE CRABBE.--Also of the transition school; in form and diction
adhering to the classicism of Pope, but, with Thomson, restoring the
pastoral to nature, the poet of the humble poor;--in the words of Byron,
"Pope in worsted stockings," Crabbe was the delight of his time; and Sir
Walter Scott, returning to die at Abbotsford, paid him the following
tribute: he asked that they would read him something amusing, "Read me a
bit of Crabbe." As it was read, he exclaimed, "Capital--excellent--very
good;