"There's a bit of doggerel; you would like a bit of botheral." W I. HERE be you going, you Devon maid? And what have ye there in the basket? Ye tight little fairy, just fresh from the dairy, Will ye give me some cream if I ask it? II. I love your hills and I love your dales, III. I'll put your basket all safe in a nook; The clouds, the trees, the rounded hills all seem, Cast wan upon it! Burns! with honour due I oft have honour'd thee. Great shadow! hide Thy face; I sin against thy native skies. WRITTEN IN BURNS' COTTAGE. HIS mortal body of a thousand days Now fills, O Burns, a space in thine own room, Where thou didst dream alone on budded bays, MEG MERRILIES. LD MEG she was a gipsy, OL And lived upon the moors: Her bed it was the brown heath turf, And her house was out of doors. Her apples were swart blackberries, Her wine was dew of the wild white rose, Her brothers were the craggy hills, Her sisters larchen trees; She lived as she did please. No breakfast had she many a morn, No dinner many a noon, And, 'stead of supper, she would stare But every morn, of woodbine fresh And, every night, the dark glen yew And gave them to the cottagers Old Meg was brave as Margaret Queen, And tall as Amazon; An old red blanket cloak she wore, A ship-hat had she on : God rest her aged bones somewhere! H SONNET ON AILSA ROCK. EARKEN, thou craggy ocean-pyramid, Give answer by thy voice-the seafowls' screams! When were thy shoulders mantled in huge streams? |