To John Taylor.

    With Pegasus upon a day,
        Apollo weary flying,
    Through frosty hills the journey lay,
        On foot the way was plying,

    Poor slip-shod giddy Pegasus
        Was but a sorry walker;
    To Vulcan then Apollo goes,
        To get a frosty calker.

    Obliging Vulcan fell to work,
        Threw by his coat and bonnet,
    And did Sol's business in a crack;
        Sol paid him with a sonnet.

    Ye Vulcan's sons of Wanlockhead,
        Pity my sad disaster;
    My Pegasus is poorly shod,
        I'll pay you like my master.

ROBERT BURNS.

Ramages, 3 o'clock, (no date.)

Robert Burns

Robert Burns, also known as Rabbie Burns, the Bard of Ayrshire, and various other names and epithets, was a Scottish poet and lyricist. He is widely regarded as the national poet of Scotland and is celebrated worldwide. Born on January 25, 1759, in Alloway, he is best known for works such as 'Auld Lang Syne,' 'Scots Wha Hae,' and 'A Red, Red Rose.' He passed away on July 21, 1796, in Dumfries.

Robert Burns

Extempore In The Court Of Session.

Robert Burns, Simple Poetry

Blithe Was She.

Robert Burns, Simple Poetry

Bruce To His Men At Bannockburn. (First Version.)

Robert Burns, Simple Poetry

On A Wag In Mauchline.

Robert Burns, Simple Poetry

English

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To Robert Graham, Esq., Of Fintray.

    Late crippl'd of an arm, and now a leg,
    About to beg a pass for leave to beg:
    Dull, listless, teas'd, dejected, and deprest,
    (Nature is adverse to a cripple's rest;)
    Will generous Graham list to his Poet's wail?
    (It soothes poor misery, hearkening to her tale,)
    And hear him curse the light he first survey'd,
    And doubly curse the luckless rhyming trade?

    Thou, Nature, partial Nature! I arraign;
    Of thy caprice maternal I complain:
    The lion and the bull thy care have found,
    One shakes the forests, and one spurns the ground:
    Thou giv'st the ass his hide, the snail his shell,
    Th' envenom'd wasp, victorious, guards his cell;
    Thy minions, kings, defend, control, devour,
    In all th' omnipotence of rule and...

Robert Burns

Epistle To Hugh Parker.

    In this strange land, this uncouth clime,
    A land unknown to prose or rhyme;
    Where words ne'er crost the muse's heckles,
    Nor limpet in poetic shackles:
    A land that prose did never view it,
    Except when drunk he stacher't thro' it,
    Here, ambush'd by the chimla cheek,
    Hid in an atmosphere of reek,
    I hear a wheel thrum i' the neuk,
    I hear it, for in vain I leuk.
    The red peat gleams, a fiery kernel,
    Enhusked by a fog infernal:
    Here, for my wonted rhyming raptures,
    I sit and count my sins by chapters;
    For life and spunk like ither Christians,
    I'm dwindled down to mere existence,
    Wi' nae converse but Gallowa' bodies,
    Wi' nae kend face but Jenny Geddes.^[1]
    Jenny, my Pegasea...

Robert Burns

Epistle To Major Logan.

    Hail, thairm-inspirin', rattlin' Willie!
    Though fortune's road be rough an' hilly
    To every fiddling, rhyming billie,
        We never heed,
    But tak' it like the unback'd filly,
        Proud o' her speed.

    When idly goavan whyles we saunter
    Yirr, fancy barks, awa' we canter
    Uphill, down brae, till some mishanter,
        Some black bog-hole,
    Arrests us, then the scathe an' banter
        We're forced to thole.

    Hale be your heart! Hale be your fiddle!
    Lang may your elbuck jink and diddle,
    To cheer you through the weary widdle
        O' this wild warl',
    Until you on a crummock driddle
        A gray-hair'd carl.

    Come wealth, come poortith, late or soon,
    Heaven send your hear...

Robert Burns

Pegasus In Pound

Once into a quiet village,
    Without haste and without heed,
In the golden prime of morning,
    Strayed the poet's winged steed.

It was Autumn, and incessant
    Piped the quails from shocks and sheaves,
And, like living coals, the apples
    Burned among the withering leaves.

Loud the clamorous bell was ringing
    From its belfry gaunt and grim;
'T was the daily call to labor,
    Not a triumph meant for him.

Not the less he saw the landscape,
    In its gleaming vapor veiled;
Not the less he breathed the odors
    That the dying leaves exhaled.

Thus, upon the village common,
    By the school-boys he was found;
And the wise men, in their wisdom,
    Put him straightway into pound.

Then the sombre village ...

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

A Vision.

    As I stood by yon roofless tower,
        Where the wa'-flower scents the dewy air,
    Where th' howlet mourns in her ivy bower
        And tells the midnight moon her care;

    The winds were laid, the air was still,
        The Stars they shot along the sky;
    The fox was howling on the hill,
        And the distant echoing glens reply.

    The stream, adown its hazelly path,
        Was rushing by the ruin'd wa's,
    Hasting to join the sweeping Nith,^[1]
        Whose distant roaring swells and fa's.

    The cauld blue north was streaming forth
        Her lights, wi' hissing eerie din;
    Athort the lift they start and shift,
        Like fortune's favours, tint as win.

    By heedless chance I turn'd mine eyes,<...

Robert Burns

The Humble Petition Of Bruar Water To The Noble Duke Of Athole.

I.

    My Lord, I know your noble ear
        Woe ne'er assails in vain;
    Embolden'd thus, I beg you'll hear
        Your humble slave complain,
    How saucy Phoebus' scorching beams
        In flaming summer-pride,
    Dry-withering, waste my foamy streams,
        And drink my crystal tide.

II.

    The lightly-jumpin' glowrin' trouts,
        That thro' my waters play,
    If, in their random, wanton spouts,
        They near the margin stray;
    If, hapless chance! they linger lang,
        I'm scorching up so shallow,
    They're left the whitening stanes amang,
        In gasping death to wallow.

III.

    Last day I grat wi' spite and teen,
        As Poet Burns came by,
    That to a bard I shou...

Robert Burns