FullReads

Is there for honest poverty
That hangs his head and a’ that?
The coward slave we pass him by–
We dare be poor for a’ that.’
* * * * *
‘The rank is but the guinea stamp–
The man’s the gowd for a’ that.’

“Nor is it in his patriotism, independence, and conviviality alone that Burns touches every mood of a Scotsman’s heart. There is an enthusiasm of humanity about Burns which you will hardly find equalled in any other author, and which most certainly does not exist in Scott.

‘Man’s inhumanity to man
Makes countless thousands mourn.’
* * * * *
‘Why has man this will and power
To make his fellow mourn?’

“These quotations might be multiplied were it necessary; but I think enough has been said to explain what puzzles ‘A.T.Q.C.’ I have an unbounded admiration of Sir W. Scott–quite as great as ‘A.T.Q.C.’ Indeed, I think him the greatest of all novelists; but, as a Scot, somewhat Anglicised by a residence in London of more than a quarter of a century, I unhesitatingly say that I would rather be the author of the above three lyrics of Burns’ than I would be the author of all Scott’s novels. Certain I am that if immortality were my aim I should be much surer of it in the one case than the other. I cannot conceive ‘Scots wha hae,’ ‘Auld Lang Syne,’ etc., ever dying. Are there any of Scott’s writings of which the same could be said? I doubt it….

–I am yours, etc., “J.B.
“London, June 18th, 1895.”

The hopelessness of the difficulty is amusingly, if rather distressingly, illustrated by this letter. Here again you have the best will in the world. Nothing could be kindlier than “J.B.’s” tone. As a Scot he has every reason to be impatient of stupidity on the subject of Burns: yet he takes real pains to set me right. Alas! his explanations leave me more than ever at sea, more desperate than ever of understanding what exactly it is in Burns that kindles this peculiar enthusiasm in Scotsmen and drives them to express it in feasting and oratory.

After casting about for some time, I suggested that Burns–though in so many respects immeasurably inferior to Scott–frequently wrote with a depth of feeling which Scott could not command. On second thoughts, this was wrongly put. Scott may have possessed the feeling, together with notions of his own, on the propriety of displaying it in his public writings. Indeed, after reading some of his letters again, I am sure he did possess it. Hear, for instance, how he speaks of Dalkeith Palace, in one of his letters to Lady Louisa Stuart:–

“I am delighted my dear little half god-daughter is turning out beautiful. I was at her christening, poor soul, and took the oaths as representing I forget whom. That was in the time when Dalkeith was Dalkeith; how changed alas! I was forced there the other day by some people who wanted to see the house, and I felt as if it would have done me a great deal of good to have set my manhood aside, to get into a corner and cry like a schoolboy. Every bit of furniture, now looking old and paltry, had some story and recollections about it, and the deserted gallery, which I have seen so happily filled, seemed waste and desolate like Moore’s