CCV.--To MR. JAMES BURNESS, WRITER, MONTROSE.
MY DEAR COUSIN,--When you offered me money assistance, little did I think I should want it so soon. A rascal of a haberdasher, to whom I owe a considerable bill, taking it into his head that I am dying, has commenced a process against me, and will infallibly put my emaciated body into jail. Will you be so good as to accommodate me, and that by return of post, with ten pounds? O James, did you know the pride of my heart, you would feel doubly for me! Alas! I am not used to beg! The worst of it is, my health was coming about finely. Melancholy and low spirits are half my disease. If I had it settled, I would be, I think, quite well in a manner.
CCVI.--To HIS FATHER-IN-LAW, JAMES ARMOUR, MASON, MAUCHLINE.[138]
MY DEAR SIR,--Do, for heaven's sake, send Mrs. Armour here immediately. My wife is hourly expecting to be put to bed. Good God! what a situation for her to be in, poor girl, without a friend! I returned from sea-bathing quarters to-day, and my medical friends would almost persuade me that I am better, but I think and feel that my strength is so gone that the disorder will prove fatal to me.--Your son-in-law,
[Footnote 138: Mrs. Burns's father. This is the very last of Burns's compositions, being written only three days before his death.]
This correspondence began in September 1792, when Burns had already been domiciled nine months in the town of Dumfries, and ended only with his death in July 1796. It originated in the request of a stranger for a series of songs to suit a projected collection of the best Scottish airs. The stranger was George Thomson, a young man of about Burns's own age, and head clerk in the office of the Board of Manufactures in Edinburgh. Thomson outlived his great correspondent by more than half a century. He died so recently as 1851, at the advanced age of ninety-two. Robert Chambers has described him as a most honourable man, of singularly amiable character and cheerful manners. It may interest some people to know that his granddaughter was the wife of Dickens, the famous novelist.
Sir,--I have just this moment got your letter. As the request you make to me will positively add to my enjoyments in complying with it, I shall enter into your undertaking with all the small portion of abilities I have, strained to their utmost exertion by the impulse of enthusiasm. Only, don't hurry me. "Deil tak the hindmost" is by no means the _crie de guerre_ of my muse. Will you, as I am inferior to none of you in enthusiastic attachment to the poetry and music of old Caledonia, and, since you request it, have cheerfully promised my mite of assistance--will you let me have a list of your airs, with the first line of the printed verses you intend for them, that I may have an opportunity of suggesting any alteration that may occur to me? You know 'tis in the way of my trade; still leaving you, gentlemen,[139] the undoubted rights of publishers, to approve or reject at your pleasure, for your own publication. _Apropos_ if you are for _English_ verses, there is, on my part, an end of the matter. Whether in the simplicity of the ballad, or the pathos of the song, I can only hope to please myself in being allowed at least a sprinkling of our native tongue. English verses, particularly the works of Scotsmen, that have merit, are certainly very eligible. "Tweedside;" "Ah! the Poor Shepherd's Mournful Fate;" "Ah! Chloris, could I now but sit," etc., you cannot mend; but such insipid stuff as "To Fanny fair, could I impart," etc., usually set to "The Mill, Mill, O," is a disgrace to the collections in which it has already appeared, and would doubly disgrace a collection that will have the very superior merit of yours. But more of this in the farther prosecution of the business, if I am to be called on for my strictures and amendments--I say, amendments; for I will not alter, accept where I myself, at least, think that I amend.