ngth the oft-told tale how, on the second Sunday of May, 1786, they
met in a sequestered spot by the banks of the River Ayr, to spend one
day of parting love; how they stood, one on either side of a small
brook, laved their hands in the stream, and, holding a Bible between
them, vowed eternal fidelity to each other. They then parted, never
again to meet. In October of the same year Mary came from Argyllshire,
as far as Greenock, in the hope of meeting Burns, but she was (p. 028)
there seized with a malignant fever which soon laid her in an early
grave.

The Bible, in two volumes, which Burns gave her on that parting day,
has been recently recovered. On the first volume is inscribed, in
Burns's hand, "And ye shall not swear by My Name falsely, I am the
Lord. Levit. 19th chap. 12th verse;" and on the second volume, "Thou
shalt not forswear thyself, but shalt perform unto the Lord thine
oath. Matth. 5th chap. 33rd verse." But the names of Mary Campbell and
Robert Burns, which were originally inscribed on the volumes, have
been almost obliterated. It has been suggested by Mr. Scott Douglas,
the most recent editor who has investigated anew the whole incident,
that, "in the whirl of excitement which soon followed that Sunday,
Burns forgot his vow to poor Mary, and that she, heart-sore at his
neglect, deleted the names from this touching memorial of their secret
betrothal."

Certain it is that in the very next month, June, 1786, we find Burns,
in writing to one of his friends about "poor, ill-advised, ungrateful
Armour," declaring that, "to confess a truth between you and me, I do
still love her to distraction after all, though I won't tell her so if
I were to see her." And Chambers even suggests that there was still a
third love interwoven, at this very time, in the complicated web of
Burns's fickle affections. Burns, though he wrote several poems about
Highland Mary, which afterwards appeared, never mentioned her name to
any of his family. Even, if there was no more in the story than what
has been here given, no wonder that a heart like Burns, which, for all
its unsteadfastness, never lost its sensibility, nor even a sense of
conscience, should have been visited by the remorse which forms the
burden of the lyric to Mary in heaven, written three years after. (p. 029)

See'st thou thy lover lowly laid?
Hear'st thou the pangs that rend his breast?

The misery of his condition, about the t