THE LIFE OF BURNS, BY ALLAN CUNNINGHAM,
SURPASSES longointervallo all the biographies that have been pre- fixed to the modern republications of men of-genius. Without excepting SOUTHEY'S Nelson, it equals the best of the various Lives that have been published during the present century. Traces of haste in its composition, of a bookmaker's wish to fill a certain space, without adequate matter, and of a false taste, which some- times sacrifices nature to theatrical effect, are indeed occasionally visible. But the staple of the work is the product of years, per- haps of a whole life. ALLAN'S father was the neighbour of the poet; the biographer himself had some acquaintance with his hero ; he attentively watched the public feeling on the announce- ment of his death-bed sickness, and followed him to his final rest- ing-place. Born and brought up in Nithstiale, his first thoughts seem to have been connected with the idea of the "inspired ploughman ;" the observations and anecdotes of youthful associates strengthened this feeling; the national prejudices of a Scotchman, and a deep study of the poet's works and of his commentators, further enriched the biographical soil; in addition to all this, when
fairly engaged In his task, he had recourse to Buitrrs's " unpub- lished journals, private letters, manuscript verses, and to well- authenticated anecdotes and traits of character supplied by his friends." If, therefore, there has been haste (as we suspect there has) in the writing, we may consider it merely as the forcing of a congenial soil; not a vain endeavour to produce grapes from thorns and figs from thistles. It is the hasty outpouring of a prepared mind ; not the hurried compilation of a "ready writer," who engages for a certain sum to fill a certain space within a certain time.
Mr. CUNNINGHAM has divided the life of BURNS into four epochs, somewhat quaintly denominated AYRSHIRE, EDINBURGH, ELLISLAND, and DumsatEs.
In AYRSHIRE, we have the parentage, birth, and education of the man, together with the mental training of the poet. The cha- racter of his parents, and the effect it had upon his own, are placed before us. We have an account of his schoolmaster, and of the early taste which BURNS received of this world's bitterness. In his rustic employments, we see the opportunities he possessed for observing Nature under all her aspects. The traditions of the country gave him machinery ; a peasantry shrewd, religious, but superstitious, the jovial associates of his leisure hours, and—in the free-traders of the coast—companions of a more questionable description, furnished him with characters, and with a knowledge of mankind ; a few authors gave him a command of language ; the inspiration of love and his own genius did the rest. Ilut though apparently pursuing farming, and creditably enough in outward seeming, his attention was mechanical, not mental. After his father's death, the pecuniary affairs of the family became embar- rassed. A collection of his Poems, published by subscription, saved him from becoming something like a negro-driver in the West Indies ; and a copy placed by a friend in the hands of BLACKLOCK, induced BURNS " to post to Edinburgh," in consequence of the encouragement he received from the amiable Doctor. The second act of the eventful drama represents BURNS as the lion of' EDINBURGH. A new and enlarged edition of his Poems was rapidly distributed. Its author became the companion and the guest of the learned, the witty, the famous, the noble, the beauti- ful, and the gay. The connexions he formed, the society in which he mixed, unsettled his habits, excited his hopes, stimulated his ambition—and that was all. Hear Mr. CUNNINGHAM on the patronage of the great of all kinds, and hereafter put not your trust in nobles or in gentles.
But the notice of lords, the attention of professors, and the kindness of beauty were empty though honourable things ; the twenty pounds which his specula- tion in verse brought, diminished rather than increased ; and he felt, with a darkening spirit, that he could not live on applause. It never seems to have occurred to any. one of his wealthy admirers, that he was in a state of destitution, and that many places of profit existed which he could fill with honour. He who is invited to feast at a distance with the powerful and the polite—who has to walk seven miles of rough road to the dinner-table—is expected to write songs on the beautiful, be witty with the witty; and at midnight return to his blan- ket and Isis straw—must he considered as baying earned his dinner fairly ; and this happened often to Burns. All that his poetry brought him was barren ap- plause. •
The poet spent the winter and spring of 1787 in Edinburgh, much after his
own heart : he loved company, and was not unwilling to show that Nature sometimes bestowed gifts against which rank and education could scarcely make good their station. This was, perhaps, the unwisest course he could have pur- sued: a man with ten thousand a year will always be considered by the world around superior to a man whose wealth lies in his genius; the dullest can esti- mate what landed property is worth, hut who can say what is the annual value of an estate which lies in the imagination ? In fame, there was no rivalry; and in wation, what hope had a poet, with the earth of his last-turned furrow still red on his Amon, to rival the Montgomerys, the Hamiltons, and the Gor- dons, with counties for estates, and the traditional Mat of a thousand years accompanying them ? In the sight of the great and the far-descended, he was still a farmer, for whom the Grass-market was the proper scene of action, and the husbandinen of the laud the proper companions; his company was sought, not from a sense that genius had raised him to an equality with lords and earls, but from a wish to see how this wild man of the West would behave himself in the presence of ladies plumed and jewelled, and lords clothed in all the terrors of their wealth and titles. s •
Those who were afraid that amid feasting and flattery—the smiling of ladies and the applauding nods of their lords—Bum ns would forget himself, and allow the mercury of vanity to rise too high within him, indulged in idle fears. When he dined or supped with the magnates of the land, he never wanted a monitor to warn him of the humility of his condition. When the company arose in the gilded and illuminated rooms, some of the fair guests—perhaps
"Her Grace, Whose flambeaux flash against the morniug skies, And gild our chamber ceilings as they pass"— took the hesitating arm of the bard, went smiling to her coach, waved a graceful good night with her jewelled hand, and, departing to her mansion, left him in the middle of the street to grope his way through the dingy allies of the " gude town" to his obscure lodging, with his share of a deal table, a sanded floor, and a chaff-bed, at eighteermence a week. That his eyes were partly open to this, we know ; but he did not perceive that these invitations arose from a wish to relieve the ennui of a supper-table, where the guests were all too well bred to utter any thing strikingly original or boldly witty. Had Burns beheld the matter in this light, he would have sprung up like Wet Tinlinn when touched with the elfin bodkin, and, overturning silver dishes, garlanded decanters, and shoving opposing ladle, and staring lords aside, made his way to the plough- tail, and reconunenced turnirig the furrows upon his cold and ungenial farm of
Mossgiel. • •
What he had seen and endured in Edinburgh, during his second visit, ad- monished him regarding the reed on which he leant, when he hoped for a place of profit and honour from the aristocracy on account of his genius. On his first appearance, the doors of the nobilisy opened spontaneous, "on golden hinges turning ;" and he ate spiced meats and drank rare wines, interchanging nods and smiles with "high dukes and mighty earls." A colder reception awaited his second coining : the doors of lords and ladies opened with a tardy courtesy ; lie was received with a cold and measured stateliness, was seldom re. quested to stop, seldomer to repeat his visit ; and one of his companions used to relate with what indignant feeling the poet recounted his fruitless calls and his
Previous page