stack, and fathom it three times round: the last fathom of the last time you will catch in your arms the appearance of your future conjugal yoke-fellow.

13 You go out, one or more, for this is a social spell, to a south-running spring or rivulet, where three lairds' lands meet,' and dip your left shirt-sleeve. Go to bed in sight of a fire, and hang your wet sleeve before it to dry. Lie awake; and, some time near midnight, an apparition, having the exact figure of the grand object in question, will come and turn the sleeve, as if to dry the other side.

14 Take three dishes; put clean water in one, foul water in another, leave the third empty: blindfold a person, and lead him to the hearth where the dishes are ranged. He (or she) dips the left hand: if by chance in the clean water, the future husband or wife will come to the bar of matrimony a maid; if in the foul, a widow; if in the empty dish, it foretels, with equal certainty, no marriage at all. It is repeated three times, and every time the arrangement of the dishes is altered.

15 Sowens, with butter instead of milk to them, is always the Halloween supper.

THE VISION.

DUAN FIRST.

THE sun had closed the winter day, The curlers quat their roaring play, An' hunger'd maukin ta'en her way To kail-yards green,

While faithless snaws ilk step betray Whare she has been.

The thresher's weary flingin tree
The lee-lang day had tired me;
And whan the day had closed his e'e,
Far i' the west,

Ben i' the spence, right pensivelie,
I gaed to rest.

There, lanely, by the ingle-cheek, I sat and eyed the spewing reek, That fill'd, wi' hoast-provoking smeek, The auld clay biggin;

An' heard the restless rattons squeak About the riggin.

All in this mottie, misty clime, I backward mused on wasted time, How I had spent my youthfu' prime, An' done nae-thing,

But stringin blethers up in rhyme,

For fools to sing.

Had I to guid advice but harkit, I might, by this, hae led a market, Or strutted in a bank, an' clarkit

My cash-account:

While here, half-mad, half-fed, half-sarkit, Is a' th' amount.

I started, mutt'ring, blockhead! coof!
An' heaved on high my waukit loof,
To swear by a' yon starry roof,

Or some rash aith,

That I, henceforth, would be rhyme-proof
Till my last breath-

When click! the string the snick did draw; And jee! the door gaed to the wa';

An' by my ingle-lowe I saw,

Now bleezin bright,

A tight, outlandish hizzie, braw,

Come full in sight.

Ye needna doubt, I held my whisht; The infant aith, half-form'd, was crusht; I glowred as eerie's I'd been dusht

In some wild glen;

When sweet, like modest worth, she blusht, And stepped ben.

Green, slender, leaf-clad holly-boughs Were twisted, gracefu',' round her brows; I took her for some Scottish Muse,

By that same token;

An' come to stop those reckless vows,

Would soon been broken.

Ahair-brain'd, sentimental trace,' Was strongly marked in her face;

A wildly-witty rustic grace

Shone full upon her;

Her eye, ev'n turn'd on empty space,

Beam'd keen with honour.

Down flow'd her robe, a tartan sheen, Till half a leg was scrimply seen;

And such a leg! my bonie Jean

Could only peer it;

Sae straught, sae taper, tight, and clean,
Nane else cam near it.

Her mantle large, of greenish hue,
My gazing wonder chiefly drew;

Deep lights and shades, bold-mingling, threw
A lustre grand;

And seem'd, to my astonish'd view,

A well-known land.

Here, rivers in the sea were lost; There, mountains to the skies were tost: Here, tumbling billows mark'd the coast, Wi' surging foam;

There, distant shone Art's lofty boast,

The lordly dome.

Here, Doon pour'd down his far-fetch'd floods;

There, well-fed Irwine stately thuds:

Auld hermit Ayr staw through his woods,

On to the shore ;

And many a lesser torrent scuds,

Wi' seeming roar.

Low, in a sandy valley spread,

An ancient borough rear'd her head;
Still, as in Scottish story read,

She boasts a race,

To every nobler virtue bred,

And polish'd grace.

By stately tower or palace fair,

Or ruins pendent in the air,

Bold stems of heroes, here and there,
I could discern;

Some seem'd to muse, some seem'd to dare,
Wi' feature stern.

My heart did glowing transport feel,
To see a race1 heroic wheel,

And brandish round the deep-dyed steel
In sturdy blows;

While back-recoiling seem'd to reel

Their suthron foes.

2

His Country's Saviour, mark him well! Bold Richardton's 3 heroic swell;

The chief on Sark 4 who glorious fell,

In high command;

And he whom ruthless fates expel

His native land.

There, where a sceptred Pictish shades Stalk'd round his ashes lowly laid, I mark'd a martial race, portray'd

In colours strong;

Bold, soldier-featured, undismay'd

They strode along.