LITMIR.BIZ

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wee bit ingle, blinkin’ bonnily.

      His clean hearth-stane, his thriftie Wifie’s smile,

      The lisping infant prattling on his knee,

      Does a’ his weary kiaugh and care beguile,

      An’ makes him quite forget his labour and his toil.

      IV.

      Belyve, the elder bairns come drapping in,

      At service out amang the farmers roun’:

      Some ca’ the pleugh, some herd, some tentie rin

      A cannie errand to a neebor town:

      Their eldest hope, their Jenny, woman grown,

      In youthfu’ bloom, love sparkling in her e’e,

      Comes hame, perhaps to shew a braw new gown,

      Or deposite her sair won penny-fee,

      To help her parents dear, if they in hardship be.

      V.

      With joy unfeign’d, brothers and sisters meet,

      An’ each for other’s welfare kindly spiers:

      The social hours, swift-wing’d, unnotic’d, fleet;

      Each tells the unco’s that he sees or hears;

      The parents, partial, eye their hopeful years;

      Anticipation forward points the view.

      The Mother, wi’ her needle an’ her shears,

      Gars auld claes look amaist as weel’s the new;

      The Father mixes a’ wi’ admonition due.

      VI.

      Their master’s an’ their mistress’s command,

      The younkers a’ are warned to obey;

      And mind their labours wi’ an eydent hand,

      An’ ne’er, tho’ out of sight, to jauk or play:

      “And O! be sure to fear the Lord alway!

      And mind your duty, duly, morn and night!

      Lest in temptation’s path ye gang astray,

      Implore His counsel and assisting might:

      They never sought in vain, that sought the Lord aright!”

      VII.

      But, hark! a rap comes gently to the door;

      Jenny, wha kens the meaning o’ the same,

      Tells how a neebor lad cam o’er the moor,

      To do some errands, and convoy her hame.

      The wily Mother sees the conscious flame

      Sparkle in Jenny’s e’e, and flush her cheek,

      With heart-struck anxious care, inquires his name,

      While Jenny hafflins is afraid to speak;

      Weel pleas’d the Mother hears it’s nae wild, worthless rake.

      VIII.

      Wi’ kindly welcome, Jenny brings him ben;

      A strappan youth; he taks the Mother’s eye;

      Blythe Jenny sees the visit’s no ill ta’en;

      The Father cracks of horses, pleughs, and kye.

      The youngster’s artless heart o’erflows wi’ joy,

      But blate, an laithfu’, scarce can weel behave;

      The Mother, wi’ a woman’s wiles, can spy

      What makes the youth sae bashfu’ and sae grave;

      Weel pleas’d to think her bairn’s respected like the lave.

      IX.

      O happy love! Where love like this is found!

      O heart-felt raptures!—bliss beyond compare!

      I’ve paced much this weary, mortal round,

      And sage experience bids me this declare—

      “If heaven a draught of heavenly pleasure spare,

      One cordial in this melancholy vale,

      ’Tis when a youthful, loving, modest pair,

      In other’s arms, breathe out the tender tale,

      Beneath the milk-white thorn that scents the ev’ning gale.”

      X.

      Is there, in human form, that bears a heart—

      A wretch! a villain! lost to love and truth!

      That can, with studied, sly, ensnaring art,

      Betray sweet Jenny’s unsuspecting youth?

      Curse on his perjur’d arts! dissembling smooth!

      Are honour, virtue, conscience, all exil’d?

      Is there no pity, no relenting ruth,

      Points to the parents fondling o’er their child?

      Then paints the ruin’d maid, and their distraction wild?

      XI.

      But now the supper crowns their simple board,

      The halesome parritch, chief of Scotia’s food:

      The soupe their only hawkie does afford,

      That ‘yont the hallan snugly chows her cood:

      The dame brings forth in complimental mood,

      To grace the lad, her weel-hain’d kebbuck, fell,

      An’ aft he’s prest, an’ aft he ca’s it guid;

      The frugal wifie, garrulous, will tell,

      How ’twas a towmond auld, sin’ lint was i’ the bell.

      XII.

      The cheerfu’ supper done, wi’ serious face,

      They, round the ingle, form a circle wide;

      The Sire turns o’er, with patriarchal grace,

      The big ha’-Bible, ance his father’s pride;

      His bonnet rev’rently is laid aside,

      His lyart haffets wearing thin an’ bare;

      Those strains that once did sweet in Zion glide,

      He wales a portion with judicious care;

      And ‘Let us worship God!’ he says, with solemn air.

      XIII.

      They chant their artless notes in simple guise;

      They tune their hearts, by far the noblest aim:

      Perhaps Dundee’s wild-warbling measures rise,

      Or plaintive Martyrs, worthy of the name;

      Or noble Elgin beets the heaven-ward flame,

      The sweetest far of Scotia’s holy lays:

      Compar’d with these, Italian trills are tame;

      The tickl’d ear no heart-felt raptures raise;

      Nae unison hae they with our Creator’s praise.

      XIV.

      The priest-like Father reads the sacred page,

      How Abram was the friend of God on high;

      Or, Moses bade eternal warfare wage

      With Amalek’s ungracious progeny;

      Or how the royal bard did groaning lie

      Beneath the stroke of Heaven’s avenging ire;

      Or Job’s pathetic plaint, and wailing cry;

      Or rapt Isaiah’s wild, seraphic fire;

      Or other holy seers that tune the sacred lyre.

      XV.

      Perhaps the Christian volume

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