first of these effects, diminish too much our disapprobation of the last. To none is this caution with more propriety addressed, than to the admirers of Burns, especially to those at that early period of life, when rash and careless associations of ideas are too easily embraced; and when the apprehension of an affinity between genius and libertinism, may produce effects which no subsequent conviction of its fallacy will be sufficient to repair. Deeply indeed must all regret, that a mind, endowed with such authority over others, should have devoted so small a part of it to correct the general laxity of moral principle; nor is it to be questioned, that the friends of piety and virtue, will more readily forgivethe practical errors of the poet, accompanied by their antidote in the personal infelicity which they created, than the publication of various passages in his writings, which indirectly plead the cause of youthful dissipation, and to which the fame of their author has given a currency too permanent and extensive for any human opposition to restrain. *

*The sequel of this Memoir, containing some desultory remarks on the literary character of Burns, will be found in the Appendix.

POEMS,

CHIEFLY

SCOTTISH.

THE TWA DOGS,

A TALE.

'TWAS in that place o' Scotland's isle

That bears the name o' AULD KING COIL,

Upon a bonie day in June,

When wearing thro' the afternoon,

Twa dogs, that were na thrang at hame,

Forgather'd ance upon a time.

A

The first I'll name, they ca'd him CÆSAR, Was keepit for his Honor's pleasure:

His hair, his size, his mouth, his lugs,
Shew'd he was nane o' Scotland's dogs,
But whalpit some place far abroad,
Where sailors gang to fish for cod.

His locked, letter'd, braw brass collar, Shew'd him the gentleman and scholar: But tho' he was o' high degree, The fient a pride na pride had he; But wad hae spent an hour carressin, Ev'n wi' a tinkler-gypsey's messin: At kirk or market, mill or smiddie, Nae tawted tyke, tho' e'er sae duddie, But he wad stan't, as glad to see him, And stroan't on stanes an' hillocks wi' him.

The tither was a ploughman's collie,

A rhyming, ranting, raving billie,

Wha for his friend an' comrade had him,
And in his freaks had LUATH ca'd him,
After some dog in Highland sang *,
Was made lang syne,-Lord knows how lang.

* Cuchullin's dog in Ossian's Fingal.