ns. I
do not know whether I do not hazard my pretensions to be a critic of
any kind, when I say that I think Virgil, in many instances, a servile
copier of Homer. If I had the Odyssey by me, I could parallel many
passages where Virgil has evidently copied, but by no means improved,
Homer. Nor can I think there is anything of this owing to the
translators; for, from everything I have seen of Dryden, I think him
in genius and fluency of language, Pope's master. I have not perused
Tasso enough to form an opinion: in some future letter, you shall have
my ideas of him; though I am conscious my criticisms must be very
inaccurate and imperfect, as there I have ever felt and lamented my
want of learning most.

R. B.

* * * * *

CXX.

TO MR. ROBERT AINSLIE.

[I have heard the gentleman say, to whom this brief letter is
addressed, how much he was pleased with the intimation, that the poet
had reunited himself with Jean Armour, for he know his heart was with
her.]

_Mauchline, May 26, 1788._

MY DEAR FRIEND,

I am two kind letters in your debt, but I have been from home, and
horribly busy, buying and preparing for my farming business, over and
above the plague of my Excise instructions, which this week will
finish.

As I flatter my wishes that I foresee many future years'
correspondence between us, 'tis foolish to talk of excusing dull
epistles; a dull letter may be a very kind one. I have the pleasure to
tell you that I have been extremely fortunate in all my buyings, and
bargainings hitherto; Mrs. Burns not excepted; which title I now avow
to the world. I am truly pleased with this last affair: it has indeed
added to my anxieties for futurity, but it has given a stability to my
mind, and resolutions unknown before; and the poor girl has the most
sacred enthusiasm of attachment to me, and has not a wish but to
gratify my every idea of her deportment. I am interrupted.--Farewell!
my dear Sir.

R. B.

* * * * *

CXXI.

TO MRS. DUNLOP.

[This letter, on the hiring season, is well worth the consideration of
all masters, and all servants. In England, servants are engaged by the
month; in Scotland by the half-year, and therefore less at the mercy
of the changeable and capricious.]

27_th May, 1788._

MADAM,

I have been torturing my philosophy to no purpose, to account for that
kind partiality of yours, which has followed me, in my