Beneath the random bield of clod or stone,
Myriads of daisies have shone forth in flower
Near the lark's nest, and in their natural hour
Have passed away; less happy than the one
That, by the unwilling ploughshare, died to prove
The tender charm of poetry and love."

Peasant Poet-Man - is, indeed, an idle distinction. Burns is sitting alone in the Auld Clay-Biggin, for it has its one retired room; and, as he says, "half-mad, half-fed, half-sarkit"-all he had made by rhyme! He is the picture of a desponding man, steeped to the lips in poverty of his own bringing on, and with a spirit vainly divided between hard realities, and high hopes beyond his reach, resolving at last to forswear all delusive dreams, and submit to an ignoble lot. When at once, out of the gloom arises a glory, effused into form by his own genius creative according to his soul's desire, and conscious of its greatness despite of despair. A thousand times before now had he been so disquieted and found no comfort. But the hour had come of self-revelation, and he knew that on earth his name was to live for ever.

"To reconcile to our imagination the entrance of an aerial being into a mansion of this kind," says the excellent Currie, "required the powers of Burns; he, however, succeeds." Burns cared not at that time for our imagination—not he, indeed, not a straw; nor did he so much as know of our existence. He knew that there was a human race; and he believed that he was born to be a great power among them, especially all over his beloved and beloving Scotland. "All hail! my

own inspired bard!" That "all hail!" he dared to hear from supernatural lips, but not till his spirit had long been gazing, and long been listening to one commissioned by the "genius of the land," to stand a Vision before her chosen poet in his hut. Reconcile her entrance to our imagination! Into no other mansion but that “ Auld Clay-Biggin" would Coila have descended from the sky.

The critic continues, "To the painting on her mantle, on which is depicted the most striking scenery, as well as the most distinguished characters of his native country, some exception may be made. The mantle of Coila, like the cup of Thyrsis (see the first Idyllium of Theocritus), and the shield of Achilles, is too much crowded with figures, and some of the objects represented upon it are scarcely admissible according to the principles of design."

We advise you not to see the first Idyllium of Theocritus. Perhaps you have no Greek. Mr Chapman's translation is as good as a translation can well be, but then you may not have a copy of it at hand. A pretty wooden cup it is, with curled

ears and ivy-twined lips-embossed thereon the figure of a woman with flowing robes and a Lydian head-dress, to whom two angry men are making love. Hard by, a stout old fisherman on a rock is in the act of throwing his net into the sea: not far from him is a vineyard, where a boy is sitting below a hedge framing a locust trap with stalks of asphodel, and guarding the grapes from a couple of sly foxes. Thyrsis, we are told by Theocritus, bought it from a Calydonian Skipper for a big cheese-cake and a goat. We must not meddle with the shield of Achilles.

Turn we then to the "Vision" of Burns, our Scottish Theocritus, as we have heard him classically called, and judge of Dr Currie's sense in telling us to see the cup of Thyrsis.

"Down flow'd her robe, a tartan sheen,

Till half her leg was scrimply seen;
And such a leg! my bonny Jean

Could only peer it ;

Sae straught, sae taper, tight, and clean,

Nane else could near it."

You observe Burns knew not yet who stood before himwoman, or angel, or fairy-but the Vision reminded him of her whom best he loved.

"Green, slender, leaf-clad holly-boughs

Were twisted gracefu' round her brows;
I took her for some Scottish Muse,

By that same token."

Some Scottish Muse-but which of them he had not leisure to conjecture, so lost was he in admiration of that mystic robe"that mantle large, of greenish hue." As he continued to gaze on her, his imagination beheld whatever it chose to behold. The region dearest to the Poet's heart is all emblazoned there-and there too its sages and its heroes.

"Here, rivers in the sea were lost;

There, mountains to the skies were tost;
Here, tumbling billows mark'd the coast,
With 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 Irvine stately thuds:
Auld hermit Ayr staw thro' his woods,
On to the shore ;

And many a lesser torrent scuds,
With 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 ev'ry nobler virtue bred,

And polish'd grace.

By stately tow'r 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,
With feature stern.

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

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

While back recoiling seem'd to reel
Their Southron foes.

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

The chief on Sark who glorious fell,
In high command;

And he whom ruthless fates expel
His native land.

There, where a sceptred Pictish shade
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."

What have become of "the laws of design?" But would good Dr Currie have dried up the sea! How many yards, will anybody tell us, were in that green mantle? And what a pattern! Thomas Campbell knew better what liberty is