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Then Kilmeny begged again to see

The friends she had left in her own countrye,
To tell of the place where she had been,
And the glories that lay in the land unseen.
With distant music, soft and deep,
They lulled Kilmeny sound asleep;
And when she awakened, she lay her lane,
All happed with flowers in the greenwood wene.
When seven lang years had come and fled,
When grief was calm and hope was dead,
When scarce was remembered Kilmeny's name,
Late, late in the gloamin Kilmeny came hame!
And oh, her beauty was fair to see,
But still and steadfast was her ee;
Such beauty bard may never declare,
For there was no pride nor passion there;
And the soft desire of maiden's een,
In that mild face could never be seen.
Her seymar was the lily flower,

And her cheek the moss-rose in the shower;
And her voice like the distant melodye,
That floats along the twilight sea.
But she loved to raike the lanely glen,
And keeped afar frae the haunts of men,
Her holy hymns unheard to sing,

To suck the flowers and drink the spring,
But wherever her peaceful form appeared,
The wild beasts of the hill were cheered;
The wolf played blithely round the field,
The lordly bison lowed and kneeled,
The dun deer wooed with manner bland,
And cowered aneath her lily hand.
And when at eve the woodlands rung,
When hymns of other worlds she sung,
In ecstacy of sweet devotion,

Oh, then the glen was all in motion;
The wild beasts of the forest came,
Broke from their bughts and faulds the tame,
And goved around, charmed and amazed;
Even the dull cattle crooned and gazed,
And murmured, and looked with anxious pain
For something the mystery to explain.
The buzzard came with the throstle-cock;
The corby left her houf in the rock;
The blackbird alang wi' the eagle flew;
The hind came tripping o'er the dew;
The wolf and the kid their raike began,

And the tod, and the lamb, and the leveret ran ;
The hawk and the hern attour them hung,
And the merl and the mavis forhooyed their young;
And all in a peaceful ring were hurled:
It was like an eve in a sinless world!

When a month and a day had come and gane,
Kilmeny sought the greenwood wene,
There laid her down on the leaves so green,
And Kilmeny on earth was never mair seen!

To the Comet of 1811.

How lovely is this wildered scene,
As twilight from her vaults so blue
Steals soft o'er Yarrow's mountains green,
To sleep embalmed in midnight dew!
All hail, ye hills, whose towering height,
Like shadows, scoops the yielding sky!
And thou, mysterious guest of night,
Dread traveller of immensity!

Stranger of heaven! I bid thee hail!
Shred from the pall of glory riven,
That flashest in celestial gale,

Broad pennon of the King of Heaven!
Art thou the flag of wo and death,

From angel's ensign-staff unfurled!
Art thou the standard of his wrath
Waved o'er a sordid sinful world?
No, from that pure pellucid beam,
That erst o'er plains of Bethlehem shone,*
No latent evil we can deem,

Bright herald of the eternal throne!
Whate'er portends thy front of fire,

Thy streaming locks so lovely paleOr peace to man, or judgments dire,

Stranger of heaven, I bid thee hail!
Where hast thou roamed these thousand years?
Why sought these polar paths again,
From wilderness of glowing spheres,

To fling thy vesture o'er the wain?
And when thou scal'st the Milky Way,
And vanishest from human view,
A thousand worlds shall hail thy ray
Through wilds of yon empyreal blue!
O! on thy rapid prow to glide!

To sail the boundless skies with thee,
And plough the twinkling stars aside,
Like foam-bells on a tranquil sea!

To brush the embers from the sun,
The icicles from off the pole;
Then far to other systems run,
Where other moons and planets roll!
Stranger of heaven! O let thine eye
Smile on a rapt enthusiast's dream;
Eccentric as thy course on high,

And airy as thine ambient beam!
And long, long may thy silver ray
Our northern arch at eve adorn;
Then, wheeling to the east away,
Light the gray portals of the morn!

When the Kye comes Hame.

Come all ye jolly shepherds
That whistle through the glen,

I'll tell ye of a secret

That courtiers dinna ken;

What is the greatest bliss

That the tongue o' man can name?

"Tis to woo a bonnie lassie

When the kye comes hame.
When the kye comes hame,
When the kye comes hame,
'Tween the gloamin and the mirk,
When the kye comes hame.
'Tis not beneath the coronet,
Nor canopy of state,
'Tis not on couch of velvet,

Nor arbour of the great-
'Tis beneath the spreading birk,
In the glen without the name,
Wi' a bonnie, bonnie lassie,

When the kye comes hame,
There the blackbird bigs his nest
For the mate he lo'es to see,
And on the topmost bough,
O, a happy bird is he!

*It was reckoned by many that this was the same which appeared at the birth of our Saviour.-Hogg.

comet

Then he pours his melting ditty,
And love is a' the theme,
And he'll woo his bonnie lassie
When the kye comes hame.
When the blewart bears a pearl,
And the daisy turns a pea,
And the bonnie lucken gowan
Has fauldit up her ee,

Then the lavrock frae the blue lift,
Draps down, and thinks nae shame
To woo his bonnie lassie

When the kye comes hame.
See yonder pawky shepherd
That lingers on the hill-
His yowes are in the fauld,
And his lambs are lying still;
Yet he downa gang to bed,

For his heart is in a flame
To meet his bonnie lassie

When the kye comes hame.

When the little wee bit heart
Rises high in the breast,
And the little wee bit starn

Rises red in the east,

O there's a joy sae dear,

That the heart can hardly frame,
Wi' a bonnie, bonnie lassie,
When the kye comes hame.

Then since all nature joins

In this love without alloy,
O, wha wad prove a traitor
To nature's dearest joy?
Or wha wad choose a crown,
Wi' its perils and its fame,
And miss his bonnie lassie
When the kye comes hame.

When the kye comes hame,
When the kye comes hame,
'Tween the gloamin and the mirk,
When the kye comes hame.

The Skylark.

Bird of the wilderness,
Blithesome and cumberless,

Sweet be thy matin o'er moorland and lea!
Emblem of happiness,

Blest is thy dwelling-place

O to abide in the desert with thee!

Wild is thy lay and loud,
Far in the downy cloud,

Love gives it energy, love gave it birth,
Where, on thy dewy wing,
Where art thou journeying?
Thy lay is in heaven, thy love is on earth.

O'er fell and fountain sheen,
O'er moor and mountain green,
O'er the red streamer that heralds the day,

Over the cloudlet dim,

Over the rainbow's rim,

Musical cherub, soar, singing, away!

Then, when the gloaming comes,
Low in the heather blooms,

Sweet will thy welcome and bed of love be!
Emblem of happiness,

Blest is thy dwelling-place

O to abide in the desert with thee!

ALLAN CUNNINGHAM.

ALLAN CUNNINGHAM, a happy imitator of the old Scottish ballads, and a man of various talents, was born at Blackwood, near Dalswinton, Dumfriesshire, December 7, 1784. His father was gardener to a

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He

and the genius of Burns. His uncle having attained some eminence as a country builder, or mason, Allan was apprenticed to him, with a view to joining or following him in his trade; but this scheme did not hold, and in 1810 he removed to London, and connected himself with the newspaper press. In 1814 he was engaged as clerk of the works, or superintendent, to the late Sir Francis Chantrey, the eminent sculptor, in whose establishment he Mr continued till his death, October 29, 1842. Cunningham was an indefatigable writer. early contributed poetical effusions to the periodical works of the day, and nearly all the songs and fragments of verse in Cromek's Remains of Nithsdale and Galloway Song (1810) are of his composition, though published by Cromek as undoubted originals. Some of these are warlike and Jacobite, some amatory and devotional (the wild lyrical breathings of Covenanting love and piety among the hills), and all of them abounding in traits of Scottish rural life and primitive manners. As songs, they are not pitched in a key to be popular; but for natural grace and tenderness, and rich Doric simplicity and fervour, these pseudo-antique strains of Mr Cunningham are inimitable. In 1822 he published Sir Marmaduke Maxwell, a dramatic poem, founded on Border story and superstition, and afterwards two volumes of Traditional Tales. Three novels of a similar description, but more diffuse and improbable-namely, Paul Jones, Sir Michael Scott, and Lord Roldan, also proceeded from his fertile pen. In 1832 he appeared again as a poet, with a 'rustic epic,' in twelve parts, entitled The Maid of Elvar. He edited a collection of Scottish songs, in four volumes, and an edition of Burns in eight volumes, to which he prefixed a life of the poet, enriched with new anecdotes and information.

To Murray's Family Library he contributed a series of Lives of Eminent British Painters, Sculptors, and Architects, which extended to six volumes, and proved the most popular of all his prose works. His last work (completed just two days before his death) was a Life of Sir David Wilkie, the distinguished artist, in three volumes. All these literary labours were produced in intervals from his stated avocations in Chantrey's studio, which most men would have considered ample employment. His taste and attainments in the fine arts were as

remarkable a feature in his history as his early ballad strains; and the prose style of Mr Cunningham, when engaged on a congenial subject, was justly admired for its force and freedom. There was always a freshness and energy about the man and

his writings that arrested the attention and excited the imagination, though his genius was but little under the control of a correct or critical judgment. Strong nationality and inextinguishable ardour formed conspicuous traits in his character; and altogether, the life of Mr Cunningham was a fine example of successful original talent and perseverance, undebased by any of the alloys by which the former is too often accompanied.

The Young Maxwell.

'Where gang ye, thou silly auld carle? And what do ye carry there?'

I'm gaun to the hill-side, thou sodger gentleman, To shift my sheep their lair.'

Ae stride or twa took the silly auld carle,

An' a gude lang stride took he:

"I trow thou to be a feck auld carle,

Will ye shaw the way to me?'

And he has gane wi' the silly auld carle,
Adown by the greenwood side;

'Light down and gang, thou sodger gentleman,
For here ye canna ride.'

He drew the reins o' his bonnie gray steed,

An' lightly down he sprang:

Of the comeliest scarlet was his weir coat,
Whare the gowden tassels hang.

He has thrown aff his plaid, the silly auld carle,
An' his bonnet frae 'boon his bree;

An' wha was it but the young Maxwell!
An' his gude brown sword drew he!

"Thou killed my father, thou vile South'ron!
An' ye killed my brethren three!
Whilk brake the heart o' my ae sister,
I loved as the light o' my ee!

Draw out yere sword, thou vile South'ron!
Red wat wi' blude o' my kin!
That sword it crapped the bonniest flower
E'er lifted its head to the sun!

There's ae sad stroke for my dear auld father!
There's twa for my brethren three!
An' there's ane to thy heart for my ae sister,
Wham I loved as the light o' my ee.'

Hame, Hame, Hame.

Hame, hame, hame, hame fain wad I be,
O hame, hame, hame, to my ain countrie!

When the flower is i' the bud, and the leaf is on the tree,

The larks shall sing me hame in my ain countrie;
Hame, hame, hame, hame fain wad I be,

O hame, hame, hame, to my ain countrie!

The green leaf o' loyalty's begun for to fa',
The bonnie white rose it is withering an' a';

But I'll water't wi' the blude of usurping tyrannie,
An' green it will grow in my ain countrie.
Hame, hame, hame, hame fain wad I be,
O hame, hame, hame, to my ain countrie!
O there's naught frae ruin my country can save,
But the keys o' kind heaven to open the grave,
That a' the noble martyrs wha died for loyaltie,
May rise again and fight for their ain countrie.
Hame, hame, hame, hame fain wad I be,
O hame, hame, hame, to my ain countrie!
The new grass is springing on the tap o' their graves;
The great are now gane, a' wha ventured to save,
But the sun through the mirk blinks blithe in my e'e,
I'll shine on ye yet in yere ain countrie.'
Hame, hame, hame, hame fain wad I be,
Hame, hame, hame, to my ain countrie!

[Fragment.]

Gane were but the winter-cauld,
And gane were but the snaw,
I could sleep in the wild woods,
Where primroses blaw.
Cauld's the snaw at my head,

And cauld at my feet,
And the finger o' death's at my een,
Closing them to sleep.

Let nane tell my father,

Or my mither sae dear,

I'll meet them baith in heaven
At the spring o' the year.

She's Gane to Dwall in Heaven.

She's gane to dwall in heaven, my lassie,
She's gane to dwall in heaven:
Ye're owre pure, quo' the voice o' God,
For dwalling out o' heaven!

O what'l she do in heaven, my lassie!
O what'l she do in heaven!
She'll mix her ain thoughts wi' angels' sangs,
An' make them mair meet for heaven.

She was beloved by a', my lassie,

She was beloved by a';
But an angel fell in love wi' her,
An' took her frae us a'.

Low there thou lies, my lassie,
Low there thou lies;

A bonnier form ne'er went to the yird,
Nor frae it will arise!

Fu' soon I'll follow thee, my lassie,
Fu' soon I'll follow thee;

Thou left me nought to covet ahin',
But took gudeness sel' wi' thee.

I looked on thy death-cold face, my lassie,
I looked on thy death-cold face;
Thou seemed a lily new cut i' the bud,
An' fading in its place.

I looked on thy death-shut eye, my lassie,
I looked on thy death-shut eye;
An' a lovelier light in the brow of heaven
Fell time shall ne'er destroy.

Thy lips were ruddy and calm, my lassie,
Thy lips were ruddy and calm;
But gane was the holy breath o' heaven
To sing the evening psalm.

There's naught but dust now mine, lassie,
There's naught but dust now mine;
My saul's wi' thee i' the cauld grave,
An' why should I stay behin'!

A Wet Sheet and a Flowing Sea.

A wet sheet and a flowing sea,
A wind that follows fast,
And fills the white and rustling sail,
And bends the gallant mast;

And bends the gallant mast, my boys,
While, like the eagle free,
Away the good ship flies, and leaves
Old England on the lee.

O for a soft and gentle wind!

I heard a fair one cry;

But give to me the snoring breeze,

And white waves heaving high;

And white waves heaving high, my boys,
The good ship tight and free-
The world of waters is our home,

And merry men are we.

There's tempest in yon horned moon,

And lightning in yon cloud;
And hark the music, mariners,
The wind is piping loud;
The wind is piping loud, my boys,
The lightning flashing free-
While the hollow oak our palace is,
Our heritage the sea.

My Nanie O.

Red rows the Nith 'tween bank and brae,
Mirk is the night and rainie O,

Though heaven and earth should mix in storm,
I'll gang and see my Nanie O;
My Nanie O, my Nanie O;

My kind and winsome Nanie O,

She holds my heart in love's dear bands,
And nane can do't but Nanie O.

In preaching time sae meek she stands,
Sae saintly and sae bonnie O,
I cannot get ae glimpse of grace,
For thieving looks at Nanie 0;
My Nanie O, my Nanie O;

The world's in love with Nanie ;
That heart is hardly worth the wear
That wadna love my Nanie O.

My breast can scarce contain my heart,
When dancing she moves finely 0;

I guess what heaven is by her eyes,
They sparkle sae divinely O;

My Nanie O, my Nanie 0;

The flower o' Nithsdale's Nanie O;

Love looks frae 'neath her lang brown hair,
And says, I dwell with Nanie O.

Tell not, thou star at gray daylight,
O'er Tinwald-top so bonnie O,
My footsteps 'mang the morning dew
When coming frae my Nanie 0;
My Nanie O, my Nanie 0;

Nane ken o' me and Nanie 0;
The stars and moon may tell't aboon,
They winna wrang my Nanie O!

The Poet's Bridal-Day Song. O! my love's like the steadfast sun, Or streams that deepen as they run; Nor hoary hairs, nor forty years, Nor moments between sighs and tearsNor nights of thought, nor days of pain, Nor dreams of glory dreamed in vainNor mirth, nor sweetest song which flows To sober joys and soften woes, Can make my heart or fancy flee One moment, my sweet wife, from thee.

Even while I muse, I see thee sit
In maiden bloom and matron wit-
Fair, gentle as when first I sued,
Ye seem, but of sedater mood;
Yet my heart leaps as fond for thee
As when, beneath Arbigland tree,

We stayed and wooed, and thought the moon

Set on the sea an hour too soon;

Or lingered 'mid the falling dew,

When looks were fond and words were few.

Though I see smiling at thy feet

Five sons and ae fair daughter sweet;

And time, and care, and birth-time woes

Have dimmed thine eye, and touched thy rose;

To thee, and thoughts of thee, belong

All that charms me of tale or song;

When words come down like dews unsought, With gleams of deep enthusiast thought,

And fancy in her heaven flies free

They come, my love, they come from thee.
O, when more thought we gave of old
To silver than some give to gold;
'Twas sweet to sit and ponder o'er

What things should deck our humble bower!
'Twas sweet to pull in hope with thee
The golden fruit from Fortune's tree;
And sweeter still to choose and twine
A garland for these locks of thine-
A song-wreath which may grace my Jean,
While rivers flow and woods are green.
At times there come, as come there ought,
Grave moments of sedater thought-
When Fortune frowns, nor lends our night
One gleam of her inconstant light;
And Hope, that decks the peasant's bower,
Shines like the rainbow through the shower,
O, then I see, while seated nigh,

A mother's heart shine in thine eye;
And proud resolve and purpose meek,
Speak of thee more than words can speak :

I think the wedded wife of mine
The best of all that's not divine.

WILLIAM TENNANT.

In 1812 appeared a singular mock heroic poem, Anster Fair, written in the ottava rima stanza, since made so popular by Byron in his Beppo and Don Juan. The subject was the marriage of Maggie Lauder, the famous heroine of Scottish song, but the author wrote not for the multitude familiar with Maggie's rustic glory. He aimed at pleasing the admirers of that refined conventional poetry, half serious and sentimental, and half ludicrous and satirical, which was cultivated by Berni, Ariosto, and the lighter poets of Italy. There was classic imagery on familiar subjects-supernatural machinery (as in the Rape of the Lock) blended with the ordinary details of domestic life, and with lively and fanciful description. An exuberance of animal spirits seemed to carry the author over the most perilous ascents, and his wit and fancy were rarely at fault. Such a pleasant sparkling volume, in a style then unhackneyed, was sure of success. 'Anster Fair' sold rapidly, and has since been often republished. The author, WILLIAM TENNANT, is a native of Anstruther, or Anster, who, whilst filling the situation of clerk in a mercantile establishment, studied ancient and modern literature, and taught himself Hebrew. His attainments were rewarded in 1813 with an appointment as parisli schoolmaster, to which was attached a salary of L.40 per annum -a reward not unlike that conferred on Mr Abraham Adams in Joseph Andrews, who being a scholar and man of virtue, was 'provided with a handsome in

come of L.23 a-year, which, however, he could not make a great figure with, because he lived in a dear country, and was a little encumbered with a wife and six children.' The author of Anster Fair' has since been appointed to a more eligible and becoming situation-teacher of classical and oriental languages in Dollar Institution, and, more recently, a professor in St Mary's college, St Andrews. He has published some other poetical works-a tragedy on the story of Cardinal Beaton, and two poems, the Thane of Fife, and the Dinging Down of the Cathedral. It was said of Sir David Wilkie that he took most of the figures in his pictures from living characters in the county of Fife, familiar to him in his youth: it is more certain that Mr Tennant's poems are all on native subjects in the same district. Indeed, their strict locality has been against their popularity; but Anster Fair' is the most diversified and richly humorous of them all, and besides being an animated, witty, and agreeable poem, it has the merit of being the first work of the kind in our language. The Monks and Giants of Mr Frere (published under the assumed name of Whistlecraft), from which Byron avowedly drew his Beppo, did not appear till some time after Mr Tennant's poem. Of the higher and more poetical parts of Anster Fair,' we subjoin a specimen :

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The saffron-elbowed Morning up the slope

Of heaven canaries in her jewelled shoes, And throws o'er Kelly-law's sheep-nibbled top Her golden apron dripping kindly dews; And never, since she first began to hop

Up heaven's blue causeway, of her beams profuse, Shone there a dawn so glorious and so gay, As shines the merry dawn of Anster market-day.

Round through the vast circumference of sky

One speck of small cloud cannot eye behold, Save in the east some fleeces bright of dye, That stripe the hem of heaven with woolly gold, Whereon are happy angels wont to lie

Lolling, in amaranthine flowers enrolled, That they may spy the precious light of God,

For when the first upsloping ray was flung
On Anster steeple's swallow-harbouring top,
Its bell and all the bells around were rung
Sonorous, jangling, loud, without a stop;
For, toilingly, each bitter beadle swung,
Even till he smoked with sweat, his greasy rope,
And almost broke his bell-wheel, ushering in
The morn of Anster Fair with tinkle-tankling din.
And, from our steeple's pinnacle outspread,
The town's long colours flare and flap on high,
Whose anchor, blazoned fair in green and red,
Curls, pliant to each breeze that whistles by;
Whilst on the boltsprit, stern, and topmast head
Of brig and sloop that in the harbour lie,
Streams the red gaudery of flags in air,
All to salute and grace the morn of Anster Fair.
The description of the heroine is equally passionate
and imaginative :-

Her form was as the Morning's blithesome star,
That, capped with lustrous coronet of beams,
Rides up the dawning orient in her car,
New-washed, and doubly fulgent from the streams-
The Chaldee shepherd eyes her light afar,

And on his knees adores her as she gleams;
So shone the stately form of Maggie Lauder,
And so the admiring crowds pay homage and applaud
her.

Each little step her trampling palfrey took,
Shaked her majestic person into grace,
And as at times his glossy sides she strook
Endearingly with whip's green silken lace,
(The prancer seemed to court such kind rebuke,
By Jove, the very waving of her arm
Loitering with wilful tardiness of pace),

Had power a brutish lout to unbrutify and charm!
Her face was as the summer cloud, whereon

The dawning sun delights to rest his rays! Compared with it, old Sharon's vale, o'ergrown With flaunting roses, had resigned its praise; For why? Her face with heaven's own roses shone, Mocking the morn, and witching men to gaze; And he that gazed with cold unsmitten soul, That blockhead's heart was ice thrice baked beneath the Pole.

Her locks, apparent tufts of wiry gold,

Lay on her lily temples, fairly dangling, And on each hair, so harmless to behold,

A lover's soul hung mercilessly strangling; The piping silly zephyrs vied to unfold

The tresses in their arms so slim and tangling,

Flung from the blessed East o'er the fair Earth And thrid in sport these lover-noosing snares, abroad.

The fair Earth laughs through all her boundless range, Heaving her green hills high to greet the beam; City and village, steeple, cot, and grange,

Gilt as with Nature's purest leaf-gold seem; The heaths and upland muirs, and fallows, change Their barren brown into a ruddy gleam, And, on ten thousand dew-bent leaves and sprays, Twinkle ten thousand suns, and fling their petty

rays.

Up from their nests and fields of tender corn
Full merrily the little skylarks spring,
And on their dew-bedabbled pinions borne,
Mount to the heaven's blue key-stone flickering;
They turn their plume-soft bosoms to the morn,
And hail the genial light, and cheer'ly sing;
Echo the gladsome hills and valleys round,

And played at hide-and-seek amid the golden hairs. Her eye was as an honoured palace, where

A choir of lightsome Graces frisk and dance; What object drew her gaze, how mean soe'er, Got dignity and honour from the glance; Wo to the man on whom she unaware

Did the dear witchery of her eye elance! 'Twas such a thrilling, killing, keen regardMay Heaven from such a look preserve each tender

bard!

So on she rode in virgin majesty,

Charming the thin dead air to kiss her lips, And with the light and grandeur of her eye Shaming the proud sun into dim eclipse; While round her presence clustering far and nigh, On horseback some, with silver spurs and whips, And some afoot with shoes of dazzling buckles,

As half the bells of Fife ring loud and swell the Attended knights, and lairds, and clowns with horny

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