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24 The memory of Burns—a name
 * That calls, when brimmed her festal cup,

A nation’s glory and her shame,
 * In silent sadness up.

A nation’s glory—be the rest
 * Forgot—she’s canonized his mind;

And it is joy to speak the best
 * We may of human kind.

I’ve stood beside the cottage-bed
 * Where the Bard-peasant first drew breath;

A straw-thatched roof above his head,
 * A straw-wrought couch beneath.

And I have stood beside the pile,
 * His monument—that tells to Heaven

The homage of earth’s proudest isle
 * To that Bard-peasant given!

Bid thy thoughts hover o’er that spot,
 * Boy-minstrel, in thy dreaming hour;

And know, however low his lot,
 * A Poet’s pride and power:

The pride that lifted Burns from earth,
 * The power that gave a child of song

Ascendency o’er rank and birth,
 * The rich, the brave, the strong;