Page:Great Men and Famous Women Volume 7.djvu/165

 ROBERT BURNS 115 throughout the county. He wrote considerably, but perhaps not so well as if he had not been hurried and worried by practical affairs. As an officer he is gener- ally admitted to have been thorough, correct, and at the same time humane ; as a farmer, he again failed, and in 1791 sold back the lease of his place, pocketed, it is said, a loss of 2,00, and moved with his family to Dumfries. Here he took up the plan of living entirely upon his salary from the Government 70 per an- num. This would seem a meagre stipend now ; but it would at that time have enabled Burns to support his family in comfort, though not in the way his abil- ities entitled him to do. His position gave him some perquisites, and he had the hope of an advance in his salary, which would follow a looked-f or. promotion to the office of supervisor. He spent his time in the performance of his duties, in collecting and writing songs for the above-mentioned compilation of Scottish melodies, and in meeting and conversing with the many friends whom his genius and geniality drew around him. But his hopes and his health gradually failed together. Dumfries was on one of the great stage lines that led to and from London, and it was often invaded by tourists who were intent on " making a night of it " with the well-known peasant-poet. In these bouts, in which he was generally willing to recite his poems and sing his songs, he received much pleasure and applause, but nothing else, save the wear and tear of dissipation. His habit of outspoken opinion, in political and other matters, proved obstacles to his advancement in the public ser- vice ; he fell gradually into debt, despondency, and disease a mournful trio of companions for the most brilliant of Scottish poets ! " An old man before his time," he lay down to die, in 1 796, having lived, as time is counted, only thirty- seven short years. The fame of this great and unfortunate poet has increased since his death ; Scotchmen everywhere thrill with pride when Burns's magic name is spoken, and the world in general has a sincere love for the warm-hearted, plain-spoken bard, who turned his own soul to the gaze of his fellow-beings, that they might the better know their own. The space of this article will not permit even an enum- eration of his wonderful poems ; the world may almost be said to know them by heart. His " Cotter's Saturday Night," " Tarn O'Shanter," " Bonnie Doon," "Auld Lang Syne," "Brace's Address," "A Man's a Man for a' That," and many others that might be named, are likely to live for generation after genera- tion ; and his character as a man, although subject in many respects to severe criticism, can always be covered with a mantle of loving charity, when we re- member his generosity of heart, his manly independence of spirit, his natural nobility of mind, and consider the difficult circumstances and terrible tempta- tions that encompassed his stormy life.