alize
perhaps the ideas of romance, yet you will never be ill-married.

Were it not for the terrors of my ticklish situation respecting
provision for a family of children, I am decidedly of opinion that the
step I have taken is vastly for my happiness. As it is I look to the
Excise scheme as a certainty of maintenance!--luxury to what either
Mrs. Burns or I were born to.

Adieu.

R. B.

* * * * *

CXXIV.

TO ROBERT AINSLIE, ESQ.

[The kindness of Field, the profilist, has not only indulged me with a
look at the original, from which the profile alluded to in the letter
was taken, but has put me in possession of a capital copy.]

_Mauchline, 23d June, 1788._

This letter, my dear Sir, is only a business scrap. Mr. Miers, profile
painter in your town, has executed a profile of Dr. Blacklock for me:
do me the favour to call for it, and sit to him yourself for me, which
put in the same size as the doctor's. The account of both profiles
will be fifteen shillings, which I have given to James Connell, our
Mauchline carrier, to pay you when you give him the parcel. You must
not, my friend, refuse to sit. The time is short: when I sat to Mr.
Miers, I am sure he did not exceed two minutes. I propose hanging Lord
Glencairn, the Doctor, and you in trio over my new chimney-piece that
is to be.

Adieu.

R. B.

* * * * *

CXXV.

TO ROBERT AINSLIE, ESQ.

["There is a degree of folly," says Burns in this letter, "in talking
unnecessarily of one's private affairs." The folly is scarcely less to
write about them, and much did the poet and his friend write about
their own private affairs as well as those of others.]

_Ellisland, June 30th, 1788._

MY DEAR SIR,

I just now received your brief epistle; and, to take vengeance on your
laziness, I have, you see, taken a long sheet of writing-paper, and
have begun at the top of the page, intending to scribble on to the
very last corner.

I am vexed at that affair of the * * *, but dare not enlarge on the
subject until you send me your direction, as I suppose that will be
altered on your late master and friend's death. I am concerned for the
old fellow's exit, only as I fear it may be to your disadvantage in
any respect--for an old man's dying, except he has been a very
benevolent character, or in some particular situation of life that the
welfare of the poor or the helpless depended on him,