a native poet, and to repair, as far
as possible, the wrongs which suffering or neglect had inflicted on
him. The _Lounger_ had at that time a wide circulation in Scotland,
and penetrated even to England. It was known and read by the poet
Cowper, who, whether from this or some other source, became acquainted
with the poems of Burns within the first year of their publication. In
July, 1787, we find the poet of _The Task_ telling a correspondent
that he had read Burns's poems twice; "and though they be written in a
language that is new to me ... I think them, on the whole, a very
extraordinary production. He is, I believe, the only poet these
kingdoms have produced in the lower rank of life since Shakespeare (I
should rather say since Prior), who need not be indebted for any part
of his praise to a charitable consideration of his origin, and (p. 048)
the disadvantages under which he has laboured." Cowper thus endorses
the verdict of Mackenzie in almost the same language.

It did not however require such testimonials, from here and there a
literary man, however eminent, to open every hospitable door in
Edinburgh to Burns. Within a month after his arrival in town he had
been welcomed at the tables of all the celebrities--Lord Monboddo,
Robertson, the historian, Dr. Hugh Blair, Dugald Stewart, Dr. Adam
Ferguson, The Man of Feeling, Mr. Fraser Tytler, and many others. We
are surprised to find that he had been nearly two months in town
before he called on the amiable Dr. Blacklock, the blind poet, who in
his well-known letter to Dr. Laurie had been the first Edinburgh
authority to hail in Burns the rising of a new star.

How he bore himself throughout that winter when he was the chief lion
of Edinburgh society many records remain to show, both in his own
letters and in the reports of those who met him. On the whole, his
native good sense carried him well through the ordeal. If he showed
for the most part due respect to others, he was still more bent on
maintaining his respect for himself; indeed, this latter feeling was
pushed even to an exaggerated independence. As Mr. Lockhart has
expressed it, he showed, "in the whole strain of his bearing, his
belief that in the society of the most eminent men of his nation he
was where he was entitled to be, hardly deigning to flatter them by
exhibiting a symptom of being flattered." All who heard him were
astonished by his wonderful powers of conversation. These impressed
them, th