come of L.23 a-year, which, however, he could not make a great figure with, because he lived in a dear country, and was a little encumbered with a wife and six children.' The author of Anster Fair' has since been appointed to a more eligible and becoming situation-teacher of classical and oriental languages in Dollar Institution, and, more recently, a professor in St Mary's college, St Andrews. He has published some other poetical works-a tragedy on the story of Cardinal Beaton, and two poems, the Thane of Fife, and the Dinging Down of the Cathedral. It was said of Sir David Wilkie that he took most of the figures in his pictures from living characters in the county of Fife, familiar to him in his youth: it is more certain that Mr Tennant's poems are all on native subjects in the same district. Indeed, their strict locality has been against their popularity; but Anster Fair' is the most diversified and richly humcrous of them all, and besides being an animated, witty, and agreeable poem, it has the merit of being the first work of the kind in our language. The Monks and Giants of Mr Frere (published under the assumed name of Whistlecraft), from which Byron avowedly drew his Beppo, did not appear till some time after Mr Tennant's poem. Of the higher and more poetical parts of 'Anster Fair,' we subjoin a specimen :

I wish I had a cottage snug and neat

Upon the top of many fountained Ide,
That I might thence, in holy fervour, greet
The bright-gowned Morning tripping up her side:

And when the low Sun's glory-buskined feet
Walk on the blue wave of the Ægean tide,
Oh! I would kneel me down, and worship there
The God who garnished out a world so bright and

fair!

The saffron-elbowed Morning up the slope

Of heaven canaries in her jewelled shoes, And throws o'er Kelly-law's sheep-nibbled top Her golden apron dripping kindly dews; And never, since she first began to hop

Up heaven's blue causeway, of her beams profuse,
Shone there a dawn so glorious and so gay,
As shines the merry dawn of Anster market-day.

Round through the vast circumference of sky
One speck of small cloud cannot eye behold,
Save in the east some fleeces bright of dye,
That stripe the hem of heaven with woolly gold,
Whereon are happy angels wont to lie
Lolling, in amaranthine flowers enrolled,
That they may spy the precious light of God,

For when the first upsloping ray was flung
On Anster steeple's swallow-harbouring top,
Its bell and all the bells around were rung
Sonorous, jangling, loud, without a stop;
For, toilingly, each bitter beadle swung,

Even till he smoked with sweat, his greasy rope,
And almost broke his bell-wheel, ushering in
The morn of Anster Fair with tinkle-tankling din.
And, from our steeple's pinnacle outspread,

The town's long colours flare and flap on high,
Whose anchor, blazoned fair in green and red,
Curls, pliant to each breeze that whistles by;
Whilst on the boltsprit, stern, and topmast head
Of brig and sloop that in the harbour lie,

Streams the red gaudery of flags in air,
All to salute and grace the morn of Anster Fair.
The description of the heroine is equally passionate
and imaginative:-

Her form was as the Morning's blithesome star,
That, capped with lustrous coronet of beams,

Rides up the dawning orient in her car,
New-washed, and doubly fulgent from the streams-
The Chaldee shepherd eyes her light afar,

And on his knees adores her as she gleams;
So shone the stately form of Maggie Lauder,
And so the admiring crowds pay homage and applaud
her.

Each little step her trampling palfrey took,
Shaked her majestic person into grace,
And as at times his glossy sides she strook
Endearingly with whip's green silken lace,
(The prancer seemed to court such kind rebuke,
Loitering with wilful tardiness of pace),
By Jove, the very waving of her arm
Had power a brutish lout to unbrutify and charm!

Her face was as the summer cloud, whereon

The dawning sun delights to rest his rays! Compared with it, old Sharon's vale, o'ergrown With flaunting roses, had resigned its praise; For why? Her face with heaven's own roses shone Mocking the morn, and witching men to gaze; And he that gazed with cold unsmitten soul, That blockhead's heart was ice thrice baked beneath

the Pole.

Her locks, apparent tufts of wiry gold,
Lay on her lily temples, fairly dangling,
And on each hair, so harmless to behold,
A lover's soul hung mercilessly strangling;
The piping silly zephyrs vied to unfold
The tresses in their arms so slim and tangling,

abroad.

The fair Earth laughs through all her boundless range, Heaving her green hills high to greet the beam; City and village, steeple, cot, and grange,

Gilt as with Nature's purest leaf-gold seem; The heaths and upland muirs, and fallows, change

Their barren brown into a ruddy gleam, And, on ten thousand dew-bent leaves and sprays, Twinkle ten thousand suns, and fling their petty

rays.

Up from their nests and fields of tender corn Full merrily the little skylarks spring, And on their dew-bedabbled pinions borne,

And played at hide-and-seek amid the golden hairs Her eye was as an honoured palace, where

A choir of lightsome Graces frisk and dance; What object drew her gaze, how mean soe'er, Got dignity and honour from the glance; Wo to the man on whom she unaware

Did the dear witchery of her eye elance! 'Twas such a thrilling, killing, keen regardMay Heaven from such a look preserve each tender

bard!

So on she rode in virgin majesty,

Mount to the heaven's blue key-stone flickering; They turn their plume-soft bosoms to the morn, And hail the genial light, and cheer'ly sing;

Echo the gladsome hills and valleys round,

Charming the thin dead air to kiss her lips, And with the light and grandeur of her eye Shaming the proud sun into dim eclipse; While round her presence clustering far and nigh, On horseback some, with silver spurs and whips, And some afoot with shoes of dazzling buckles,

His humour and lively characteristic painting are well displayed in the account of the different parties who, gay and fantastic, flock to the fair, as Chaucer's pilgrims did to the shrine of Thomas-a-Becket. The following verses describe the men from the north :

Comes next from Ross-shire and from Sutherland

The horny-knuckled kilted Highlandman: From where upon the rocky Caithness strand Breaks the long wave that at the Pole began, And where Lochfine from her prolific sand

Her herrings gives to feed each bordering clan, Arrive the brogue-shod men of generous eye, Plaided and breechless all, with Esau's hairy thigh.

They come not now to fire the Lowland stacks,

Or foray on the banks of Fortha's firth; Claymore and broadsword, and Lochaber axe, Are left to rust above the smoky hearth; Their only arms are bagpipes now and sacks;

Their teeth are set most desperately for mirth;

- And at their broad and sturdy backs are hung ■Great wallets, crammed with cheese and bannocks and cold tongue.

Nor staid away the Islanders, that lie

To buffet of the Atlantic surge exposed; From Jura, Arran, Barra, Uist, and Skye, Piping they come, unshaved, unbreeched, unhosed; And from that Isle, whose abbey, structured high,

Within its precincts holds dead kings enclosed, Where St Columba oft is seen to waddle Gowned round with flaming fire upon the spire

astraddle.

Next from the far-famed ancient town of Ayr,

(Sweet Ayr! with crops of ruddy damsels blest,
That, shooting up, and waxing fat and fair,
Shine on thy braès, the lilies of the west!)
And from Dumfries, and from Kilmarnock (where
Are night-caps made, the cheapest and the best)
Blithely they ride on ass and mule, with sacks
In lieu of saddles placed upon their asses' backs.

Close at their heels, bestriding well-trapped nag,
Or humbly riding asses' backbone bare,
Come Glasgow's merchants, each with money-bag,
To purchase Dutch lintseed at Anster Fair-
Sagacious fellows all, who well may brag
Of virtuous industry and talents rare;
The accomplished men o' the counting-room confest,
And fit to crack a joke or argue with the best.
Nor keep their homes the Borderers, that stay
Where purls the Jed, and Esk, and little Liddel,
Men that can rarely on the bagpipe play,
And wake the unsober spirit of the fiddle;
Avowed freebooters, that have many a day
Stolen sheep and cow, yet never owned they did ill;
Great rogues, for sure that wight is but a rogue
That blots the eighth command from Moses' decalogue.

And some of them in sloop of tarry side,

Come from North-Berwick harbour sailing out; Others, abhorrent of the sickening tide, Have ta'en the road by Stirling brig about, And eastward now from long Kirkaldy ride, Slugging on their slow-gaited asses stout, While dangling at their backs are bagpipes hung, And dangling hangs a tale on every rhymer's tongue.

WILLIAM MOTHERWELL.

WILLIAM MOTHERWELL (1797-1835) was born in Glasgow, but, after his eleventh year, was brought up under the care of an uncle in Paisley. At the age of twenty-one, he was appointed deputy to the heriff-clerk at that town. He early evinced a love

of poetry, and in 1819 became editor of a miscellany entitled the Harp of Renfrewshire. A taste for antiquarian research

Not harsh and crabbed, as dull fools supposedivided with the muse the empire of Motherwell's genius, and he attained an unusually familiar acquaintance with the early history of our native literature, particularly in the department of traditionary poetry. The results of this erudition appeared in Minstrelsy Ancient and Modern (1827), a collection of Scottish ballads, prefaced by a historical introduction, which must be the basis of all future investigations into the subject. In the following year he became editor of a weekly journal in Paisley, and established a magazine there, to which he contributed some of his happiest poetical effusions. The talent and spirit which he evinced in his editorial duties, were the means of advancing him to the more important office of conducting the Glasgow Courier, in which situation he continued till his death. In 1832 he collected and published his poems in one volume. He also joined with Hogg in editing the works of Burns; and he was collecting materials for a life of Tannahill, when he was suddenly cut off by a fit of apoplexy at the early age of thirty-eight. The taste, enthusiasm, and social qualities of Motherwell, rendered him very popular among his townsmen and friends. As an antiquary, he was shrewd, indefatigable, and truthful. As a poet, he was happiest in pathetic or sentimental lyrics, though his own inclinations led him to prefer the chivalrous and martial style of the old minstrels.

Jeanie Morrison.

I've wandered east, I've wandered west,
Through mony a weary way;

But never, never can forget

The luve of life's young day!
The fire that's blawn on Beltane e'en,
May weel be black gin Yule;
But blacker fa' awaits the heart
Where first fond luve grows cule.

O dear, dear Jeanie Morrison,
The thochts o' bygane years
Still fling their shadows owre my path,
And blind my een wi' tears!

They blind my een wi' saut, saut tears,
And sair and sick J pine,
As memory idly sum nons up

The blithe blinks o' langsyne.

'Twas then we luvit ilk ither weel,

'Twas then we twa did part;

Sweet time!-sad time!-twa bairns at schule,

Twa bairns, and but ae heart!

'Twas then we sat on ae laigh bink,

To lear ilk ither lear;

And tones, and looks, and smiles were shed,
Remembered ever mair.

I wonder, Jeanie, aften yet,
When sitting on that bink,

Cheek touchin' cheek, loof locked in loof,
What our wee heads could think.

When baith bent doun owre ae braid page,

Wi' ae buik on our knee,
Thy lips were on thy lesson, but
My lesson was in thee.

O mind ye how we hung our heads,
How cheeks brent red wi' shame,
Whene'er the schule-weans, laughin', said,
We cleeked thegither hame?

And mind ye o' the Saturdays

(The schule then skail't at noon), When we ran aff to speel the braes

The broomy braes o' June?

My head rins round and round about, My heart flows like a sea,

As ane by ane the thochts rush back

O' schule-time and o' thee.
Oh, mornin' life! oh, mornin' luve!
Oh, lichtsome days and lang,
When hinnied hopes around our hearts,
Like simmer blossoms, sprang!

O mind ye, luve, how aft we left
The deavin' dinsome toun,
To wander by the green burnside,
And hear its water croon?

The simmer leaves hung owre our heads,
The flowers burst round our feet,

And in the gloamin' o' the wud
The throssil whusslit sweet.

The throssil whusslit in the wud,
The burn sung to the trees,
And we with Nature's heart in tune,
Concerted harmonies;

And on the knowe abune the burn,
For hours thegither sat
In the silentness o' joy, till baith
Wi' vera gladness grat!

Aye, aye, dear Jeanie Morrison,

Tears trinkled doun your cheek,
Like dew-beads on a rose, yet nane
Had ony power to speak!
That was a time, a blessed time,

When hearts were fresh and young,
When freely gushed all feelings forth,
Unsyllabled-unsung!

I marvel, Jeanie Morrison,

Gin I hae been to thee

As closely twined wi' earliest thochts

As ye hae been to me?

Oh! tell me gin their music fills

Thine ear as it does mine;

Oh! say gin e'er your heart grows grit

Wi' dreamings o' langsyne?

I've wandered east, I've wandered west,

I've borne a weary lot;

But in my wanderings, far or near,

Ye never were forgot.

The fount that first burst frae this heart,

Still travels on its way;

And channels deeper as it rins,

The luve o' life's young day.

O dear, dear Jeanie Morrison,

Since we were sindered young,
I've never seen your face, nor heard
The music o' your tongue;
But I could hug all wretchedness,

And happy could I dee,

Did I but ken your heart still dreamed O' bygane days and me!

The Midnight Wind.

Mournfully! oh, mournfully
This midnight wind doth sigh,
Like some sweet plaintive melody
Of ages long gone by:

It speaks a tale of other years-
Of hopes that bloomed to die
Of sunny smiles that set in tears,
And loves that mouldering lie!

Mournfully! oh, mournfully

This midnight wind doth moan;

It stirs some chord of memory
In each dull heavy tone.
The voices of the much-loved dead
Seem floating thereupon-
All, all my fond heart cherished
Ere death had made it lone.

Mournfully! oh, mournfully
This midnight wind doth swell,
With its quaint pensive minstrelsy,
Hope's passionate farewell
To the dreamy joys of early years,
Ere yet grief's canker fell

On the heart's bloom-ay, well may tears
Start at that parting knell!

Sword Chant of Thorstein Raudi.

'Tis not the gray hawk's flight o'er mountain and mere;
"Tis not the fleet hound's course, tracking the deer;
'Tis not the light hoof-print of black steed or gray,
Though sweltering it gallop a long summer's day,
Which mete forth the lordships I challenge as mine:

Ha! ha! 'tis the good brand
I clutch in my strong hand,

That can their broad marches and numbers define.
LAND GIVER! I kiss thee.

Dull builders of houses, base tillers of earth,
Gaping, ask me what lordships I owned at my birth.
But the pale fools wax mute when I point with my

sword

strand,

And won him the glory of undying song.
Keen cleaver of gay crests,

Sharp piercer of broad breasts,

Grim slayer of heroes, and scourge of the strong!
FAME GIVER! I kiss thee.

In a love more abiding than that the heart knows
For maiden more lovely than summer's first rose,
My heart's knit to thine, and lives but for thee;
In dreamings of gladness thou'rt dancing with me,
Brave measures of madness, in some battle field,

Where armour is ringing,

And noble blood springing,

And cloven, yawn helmet, stout hauberk, and shield, DEATH GIVER! I kiss thee.

504

The smile of a maiden's eye soon may depart;
And light is the faith of fair woman's heart;
Changeful as light clouds, and wayward as wind,
Be the passions that govern weak woman's mind.
But thy metal's as true as its polish is bright:
When ills wax in number,
Thy love will not slumber;

But, starlike, burns fiercer the darker the night.
HEART GLADDENER! I kiss thee.

My kindred have perished by war or by wave;
Now, childless and sireless, I long for the grave.
When the path of our glory is shadowed in death,
With me thou wilt slumber below the brown heath;
Thou wilt rest on my bosom, and with it decay;

While harps shall be ringing,

And Scalds shall be singing

The deeds we have done in our old fearless day.
SONG GIVER! I kiss thee.

ROBERT NICOLL,

ROBERT NICOLL (1814-1837) was a young man of high promise and amiable dispositions, who cultivated literature amidst many discouragements. He was a native of Auchtergaven, in Perthshire. After passing through a series of humble employments, during which he steadily cultivated his mind by reading and writing, he assumed the editorship of the Leeds Times, a weekly paper representing the extreme of the liberal class of opinions. He wrote as one of the three hundred might be supposed to have fought at Thermopylæ, animated by the pure love of his species, and zeal for what he thought their interests; but, amidst a struggle which scarcely admitted of a moment for reflection on his own position, the springs of a naturally weak constitution were rapidly giving way, and symptoms of consumption became gradually apparent. The poet died in his twenty-fourth year, deeply regretted by the numerous friends whom his talents and virtues had drawn around him. Nicoll's poems are short occasional pieces and songs the latter much inferior to his serious poems, yet displaying happy rural imagery and fancy.

We are Brethren a'.

A happy bit hame this auld world would be,

If men, when they're here, could make shift to agree,
An' ilk said to his neighbour, in cottage an' ha',
'Come, gi'e me your hand-we are brethren a'."

I ken na why ane wi' anither should fight,
When to 'gree would make a'body cosie an' right,
When man meets wi' man, 'tis the best way ava,
To say, 'Gi'e me your hand-we are brethren a'."

My coat is a coarse ane, an' yours may be fine,
And I maun drink water, while you may drink wine;
But we baith ha'e a leal heart, unspotted to shaw:
Sae gi'e me your hand-we are brethren a'.

The knave ye would scorn, the unfaithfu' deride;
Ye would stand like a rock, wi' the truth on your side;
Sae would I, an' nought else would I value a straw;
Then gi'e me your hand-we are brethren a'.

Ye would scorn to do fausely by woman or man;
I haud by the right aye, as weel as I can;
We are ane in our joys, our affections, an' a';
Come, gi'e me your hand-we are brethren a'.

Your mother has lo'ed you as mithers can lo'e;
An' mine has done for me what mithers can do;
We are ane high an' laigh, an' we shouldna be twa:
Sae gi'e me your hand-we are brethren a'.

We love the same simmer day, sunny and fair;
Hame! oh, how we love it, an' a' that are there!
Frae the pure air of heaven the same life we draw-
Come, gi'e me your hand-we are brethren a'.

Frail shakin' auld age will soon come o'er us baith,
An' creeping alang at his back will be death;
Syne into the same mither-yird we will fa':
Come, gi'e me your hand-we are brethren a'.

[This poem is supposed to have been the last, or among the
last, of Nicoll's compositions.)

The dew is on the summer's greenest grass,
Through which the modest daisy blushing peeps;

| The gentle wind that like a ghost doth pass,
A waving shadow on the corn-field keeps;
But I, who love them all, shall never be
Again among the woods, or on the moorland lea!
The sun shines sweetly-sweeter may it shine!-

Blessed is the brightness of a summer day;
It cheers lone hearts; and why should I repine,
Although among green fields I cannot stray!
Woods! I have grown, since last I heard you wave,
Familiar with death, and neighbour to the grave!
These words have shaken mighty human souls-
Like a sepulchre's echo drear they sound-
E'en as the owl's wild whoop at midnight rolls
The ivied remnants of old ruins round.
Yet wherefore tremble? Can the soul decay?
Or that which thinks and feels in aught e'er fade

away?

Are there not aspirations in each heart

After a better, brighter world than this? Longings for beings nobler in each part

Things more exalted-steeped in deeper bliss?

The Exile's Song. Oh! why left I my hame ? Why did I cross the deep? Oh! why left I the land Where my forefathers sleep? I sigh for Scotia's shore, And I gaze across the sea, But I canna get a blink O' my ain countrie! The palm-tree waveth high, And fair the myrtle springs; And, to the Indian maid,

The bulbul sweetly sings. But I dinna see the broom Wi' its tassels on the lea, Nor hear the lintie's sang O' my ain countrie! Oh! here no Sabbath bell Awakes the Sabbath morn, Nor song of reapers heard Amang the yellow corn: For the tyrant's voice is here, And the wail of slaverie; But the sun of freedom shines In my ain countrie! There's a hope for every wo, And a balm for every pain, But the first joys o' our heart Come never back again. There's a track upon the deep, And a path across the sea; But the weary ne'er return To their ain countrie!

In the Days o' Langsyne.

1

The bud is budding now for immortality!

When we made our ain bannocks, and brewed our ain

yill,

An' were clad frae the sheep that gaed white on the hill; O! the thocht o' thae days gars my auld heart aye fill!

Death comes to lead me from mortality,

To lands which know not one unhappy hour;

I have a hope, a faith-from sorrow here

In the days o' langsyne we were happy and free,
Proud lords on the land, and kings on the sea!
To our foes we were fierce, to our friends we were kind,

If I have loved the forest and the field,

The banner of Scotland float high in the wind!

Can I not love them deeper, better there?

If all that Power hath made, to me doth yield

Something of good and beauty-something fairFreed from the grossness of mortality,

May I not love them all, and better all enjoy?
A change from wo to joy-from earth to heaven,
Death gives me this-it leads me calmly where
The souls that long ago from mine were riven

May meet again! Death answers many a prayer. Bright day, shine on! be glad days brighter far Are stretched before my eyes than those of mortals

are!

ROBERT GILFILLAN.

Though no Scottish poetry besides that of Burns attracts attention out of its native country, there is not wanting a band of able and warm-hearted men who continue to cultivate it for their own amusement and that of their countrymen. Amongst these may be mentioned MESSRS RODGER, BALLANTYNE, VEDDER, and GRAY: a high place in the class is due to MR ROBERT GILFILLAN, a native of Dunfermline, whose Poems and Songs have passed through three editions. The songs of Mr Gilfillan are marked by gentle and kindly feelings, and a smooth flow of versification, which makes them eminently suitable for being expressed in music.

In the days o' langsyne we aye ranted and sang
By the warm ingle side, or the wild braes amang;
Our lads busked braw, and our lasses looked fine,
An' the sun on our mountains seemed ever to shine;
O! where is the Scotland o' bonnie langsyne f
In the days o' langsyne ilka glen had its tale,
Sweet voices were heard in ilk breath o' the gale;
An' ilka wee burn had a sang o' its ain,
As it trotted alang through the valley or plain;
Shall we e'er hear the music o' streamlets again i
In the days o' langsyne there were feasting and glee,
Wi' pride in ilk heart, and joy in ilk ee;
[tyne,
And the auld, 'mang the nappy, their eild seemed to
It was your stoup the nicht, and the morn 'twas mine:
O! the days o' langsyne-O! the days o' langsyne.