26 SKETCH OF THE AUTHORS LIFE. 



drawn, and thought that he drove his plough to an- 

 other tune, that of dour, determined, conquering toil, 

 tugging at his awkward nags amid the birns and 

 bumping boulders of a farm which never could yield 

 meat or clothes, or household peace to the poor tenant. 

 He thought if ever Burns played a servile part it was 

 in dedicating his poems to the Caledonian Hunt. 

 What did such a pack care about poems ! They 

 were a bye word in Scotland at the very time, for a 

 story had gone abroad that they had hunted a bitch 

 fox over several miles of country, and at the death 

 found the poor animal had carried one of its pups all 

 the way in its mouth. It was a treat to see the un- 

 affected bonhomie of the "old man eloquent," elevated 

 on the lecture bench, to talk of Burns. He had the 

 key of a sympathetic fellow-feeling to all the phases 

 of Burns' life. No one who listened, but admitted 

 that a shrewder, more instinctive apprehension of 

 that life, had seldom been produced. When he came 

 to offer selections of the favourite poems, his warm 

 loving admiration of the verses knew no bounds. 

 " Here awa, there awa, wandering Willie," he de- 

 signated the tenderest and most beautiful love song 

 which ever came from the lips of man ; and as his 

 voice repeated several of the stanzas, the tributary 

 tears of emotion coursed down his cheeks. The lee- 



