company with congenial spirits, once going a very
little way into England. He was received gladly and hospitably
everywhere by those who had read and admired his poems. His journals
and letters during that period, probably upon the whole the most happy
in his life, teem with accounts of courtesies, hospitalities,
merry-makings, and gallantries, which he mentions as taking place all
along the route. His poetic pen never seems to have remained idle very
long at a time; and albums, fly-leaves, note-books, letters, and
sometimes windowpanes, received in turn his quaint and fiery verses.

In October he returned to Edinburgh, where he remained for some time,
filling social engagements, entangling himself in certain affairs of
the heart, and endeavoring to get a settlement with his publisher,
whom he considered as owing him the immediate payment of a
considerable sum of money. He also assisted a compiler in making
collections of old Scottish songs, and in furnishing new words to old
airs. It is a singular fact, that while Burns was willing to earn
money with the regular edition of his poems, he steadfastly declined
remuneration for his songs, claiming that he did the work for love.

With the natural Scotch thrift of his fathers, he soon decided that he
must have some more substantial occupation than that of a poet, and he
applied for and received a position in the Excise. To add to his
income he, in 1788, leased a farm on the river Nith, about twelve
miles from Dumfries. The place contained one hundred acres, and was
stated to be "more the choice of a poet than of a farmer." Its fine
situation and beautiful views compensated, perhaps, in Burns's mind,
for its sterility.

Here he brought his wife, Jean Armour, whom he had married under such
unpleasant circumstances a few years before, and to whom he was drawn
again as much by pity as by love, her parents having turned her out of
doors. It is hardly necessary to say that the parents received him
with open arms, now that he came with some signs of prosperity; and he
no doubt entered anew upon married life with their sincere, if
somewhat tardy, blessing.

[Illustration: Burns and Highland Mary.]

Upon this farm of "Ellisland" Burns lived three years, and during that
time he had three occupations--farmer, poet, and excise officer. In
the last-named he was in the habit of riding two hundred miles per
week, to different points throughout the county. He wrote
considerably, but p