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SOME OBSERVATIONS ON THE POETRY OF THE AGRICULTURAL AND THAT
OF THE PASTORAL DISTRICTS OF SCOTLAND, ILLUSTRATED BY A COM-
PARATIVE VIEW OF THE GENIUS OF BURNS AND THE ETTRICK SHEPHERD.

SCOTLAND has better reason to be proud of her peasant pocts than any other country in the world. She possesses a rich treasure of poetry, expressing the moral character of her population at very remote times; and in her national lyrics alone, so full of tenderness and truth, the heart of a simple, and wise, and thoughtful people is embalmed to us in imperishable beauty. If we knew nothing of the forefathers of our Scottish hainlets, but the pure and affectionate songs and ballads, the wild and pathetic airs of music which they loved, we should know enough to convince us that they were a race of men strong, healthful, happy, and dignified in the genial spirit of nature. The lower orders of the Scotch seem always to have had deeper, calmer, purer, and more reflecting affections than those of any other people, and at the same time they have possessed, and do still possess, an imagination that broods over these affections with a constant delight, and kindles them into a strength and power, which, when brought into action by domestic or national trouble, have often been in good truth sublime.

Whatever may have been the causes of this fine character in more remote times, it seems certain, that, since the Reformation, it is to be attributed chiefly to the spirit of their Religion. That spirit is pervading and profound: it blends intimately with all the relations of life, and gives a quiet and settled permanency to feelings, which, among a population uninspired by an habitual reverence for high and holy things, are little better than the uncertain, fluctuating, and transitory imIt is thus pulses of temperament. that there is something sacred and sublime in the tranquillity of a Scottish cottage. The Sabbath-day seems to extend its influence over all the week. The Bible lies from week's end to week's end visible before the eyes of all the inmates of the house; the language of Scripture is so familiar to the minds of the peasantry, that it is often adopted unconsciously in the conversation of common hours; in short, all the forms, modes, shews

of life are, in a great measure, either
moulded or coloured by Religion.

All enlightened foreigners have been
impressed with a sense of the gran-
deur of such a national character, but
they have failed in attributing it to
The blessings of E-
the right cause.
ducation have indeed been widely dif-
fused over Scotland, and her Parish-
Schools have conferred upon her ines-
timable benefits. But there is such
simplicity and depth of moral feeling
and affection in her peasantry,-such
power over the more agitating and tu-
multuous passions, which, without
weakening their lawful energies, con-
trols and subdues their rebellious ex-
citement, there is an imagination so
purely and loftily exercised over the
objects of their human love,-that we
must look for the origin of such a
character to a far higher source than
the mere culture of the mind by means
of a rational and widely-extended sys-
tem of Education. It is the habitual
faith of the peasantry of this happy
and beautiful land," that has made
them whole." The undecaying sanc-
tities of religion have, like unseen
household gods, kept watch by their
hearth-sides from generation to gene-
ration; and their belief in the Bible
is connected with all that is holiest
and dearest in filial and parental love.
A common piece of wood, the mean-
est article of household furniture, is
prized, when it is a relic of one ten-
derly beloved; but the peasant of
Scotland has a relic of departed affec-
tion, that lifts his nature up to hea-
ven, when he takes into his reveren-
tial hands,

"THE BIG HA' BIBLE, ANCE HIS FATHER'S PRIDE."

None who have enjoyed the happiness and the benefit of an intimate knowledge of the peasantry of Scotland will think this picture of their character overdrawn or exaggerated. We are not speaking of ideal beingsbut of men marked, even in their best state, with many defects, frailties, errors, and vices. But that the Scotch are a devout people, one day wisely passed in Scotland would car ry conviction to a stranger's heart;

and when it is considered how many noble and elevating feelings are included within the virtue of DEVOTION,-unfearing faith, submissive reverence, calm content, and unshaken love, we acknowledge, that a people who, emphatically speaking, fear God, must possess within themselves the elements of all human virtue, happiness, and wisdom,-however much these may be occasionally weakened or polluted by the mournful necessities of life,-grief, ignorance, hard labour, penury, and disease.

It is the heart of the people, not merely their external character, of which we speak, though that too is beyond all comparison the most interesting and impressive of any nation in the world. It would require a long line of thought to fathom the depth of a gray-haired Scottish peasant's heart, who may have buried in the churchyard of his native village the partner of a long life, and the children she had brought to bless it. Time wears not out from his heart any impression that love has once graven there; it would seem, that the strength of affections relying on heaven when earth has lost all it valued, preserved old age from dotage and decay. If religion is most beautiful and lovely in the young, the happy, and the innocent, we must yet look for the consummation of its sublimity in the old, the repentant, and the resigned, and both may be seen

"In some small kirk upon its sunny brae, When Scotland lies asleep on the still Sabbath-day."

The Scottish peasantry are poetical, therefore, because they are religious. A heart that habitually cherishes religious feelings, cannot abide the thought of pure affections and pure delights passing utterly away. It would fain give a permanent existence to the fleeting shadows of earthly happiness. Its dreams are of heaven and eternity, and such dreams reflect back a hallowed light on earth and on time. We are ourselves willing, when our hour is come, to perish from the earth; but we wish our thoughts and feelings to live behind us; and we cannot endure the imagined sadness and silence of their extinction. Had a people no strong hope of the future, how could they deeply care for the past? or rather, how could the past awaken any

thoughts but those of despondency and despair? A religious people tread constantly as it were on consecrated ground. It cannot be said, that there is any death among them; for we cannot forget those whom we know we shall meet in heaven. But unless a people carry on their hopes and affections into an eternal future, there must be a deplorable oblivion of objects of affection vanished,-a still-increasing

"dearth

Of love upon hopeless earth.”

Religion, then, has made the Scottish people thoughtful and meditative in their intellects-simple and pure in their morals-tender and affectionate But when there is in their hearts.

profound thought and awakened sensibility, imagination will not fail to reign; and if this be indeed the general character of a whole people, and should they moreover be blessed with a beautiful country, and a free government, then those higher and purer feelings which, in less happy lands, are possessed only by the higher ranks of society, are brought into free play over all the bosom of society; and it may, without violence, be said, that a spirit of poetry breathes over all its valleys.

Of England, and of the character of her population, high and low, we think with exultation and with pride. Some virtues they perhaps possess in greater perfection than any other people. But we believe, that the most that there is a depth of moral and rephilosophical Englishmen acknowledge ligious feeling in the peasantry of Scotland, not to be found among the best part of their own population. There cannot be said to be any poetry of the peasantry of England. We do not feel any consciousness of national prejudice, when we say, that a great poet could not be born among the English peasantry-bred among them

and restricted in his poetry to subjects belonging to themselves and their life.

There doubtless are among the peasantry of every truly noble nation, much to kindle the imagination and the fancy; but we believe, that in no country but Scotland does there exist a system of social and domestic life among that order of men, which combines within it almost all the finer and higher emotions of cultivated minds,

with a simplicity and artlessness of character peculiar to persons of low estate. The fireside of an English cottager is often a scene of happiness and virtue; but unquestionably, in reading the "Cottar's Saturday Night" of Burns, we feel, that we are reading the records of a purer, simpler, more pious race; and there is in that immortal poem a depth of domestic joy-an intensity of the feeling of home-a presiding spirit of love and a lofty enthusiasm of religion, which are all peculiarly Scottish, and beyond the pitch of mind of any other people.

It is not our intention at present, to pursue this interesting subject into its inmost recesses; we may have said enough to awaken the meditations of our readers on the poetical character of our peasantry. Yet, it may not be amiss to say a few words on the difference of poetical feeling and genius in an agricultural and pastoral state of life,-exemplified as that difference appears to be in the poetry of Burns, and his only worthy successor, the Ettrick Shepherd.

And, in the first place, it is undeniable, that in an agricultural country, the life of a peasant is a life of severe and incessant labour, leaving him apparently few opportunities for the cultivation and enjoyment either of his moral or intellectual nature. Each hour has its task,-and when the body is enslaved, with difficulty may the soul be free.

In the second place, the knowledge which men thus situated are likely to wish to attain, is of a narrow and worldly kind, immediately connected with the means of subsistence, and not linked with objects fitted to awaken much enthusiastic or imaginative feelings. The knowledge absolutely essential to a cottar in an agricultural country is small indeed, and small ac cordingly it will be found to be in almost all cases. Sobriety and prudence are his chief virtues; but his duties and his cares make no demand on qualities or feelings of a higher kind.

Thirdly, the face of an agricultural country cannot be very kindling to the senses or imagination. It is all subordinated to separate and distinct uses; one great end, namely, production, is constantly obtruded on the mind among all the shews of scenery, and that alone must be fatal to all play of imagination.

Fourthly, the constant and close intercourse between the inhabitants, arising from the density of population, gives to the people a tone of thought alien from all enthusiasm, and consequently from all superstition. Any superstitious forms that may rise up among them will be but slight modifications of feelings excited by the objects of reality, and will possess but a feeble power among the depressing and deadening influences of a life on the whole so unimaginative.

And, lastly, it may be asserted, that if such be the character of an agricultural life, the religion of the people will rather be of a sedate and rational kind, than characterized by that fervour, and even passion, without which it is apt to degenerate into a cautionary system of morality, instead of being a kindling, supporting, and elevating faith..

On the whole, therefore, it would seem that it is not to an agricultural country that we are to look for a poetical character in its inhabitants, or for the appearance among them of a great and prevailing poet.

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In a pastoral state of society, the scene assumes a very different aspect. For, in the first place, shepherds and men, connected with a pastoral life, are not bowed down by bodily labour constant and severe,"-and both the thoughts and the affections have time for indulgence. They have also a more intimate acquaintance with the great and simple forms of nature, and with them are necessarily associated many of their best daily emotions. They hold converse with nature, and become even in the painful prosecution of their necessary labours, unconsciously familiar with her language. Their own language then becomes poetical, and doubtless influences their characters. Their affections become spiritualized along with their imagination, and there is a fine and delicate breath and shadow of superstition over all the character of their best emotions. Their very religion partakes somewhat of the wildness of superstitious fear: the lonely edifice built for the service of God in the mountain solitude is surrounded by spots haunted by the beings of a fairy creed.

It is certain that it has been in the pastoral vallies of the south of Scotland that the poetical genius of our

country has been most beautifully displayed; and though the peculiar history of those districts, as well as the circumstances under which their language grew, were especially favourable to the formation and display of poetical feeling, yet we are not to look to such narrow and limited causes as these for the acknowledged superiority of the genius of the shepherds of the south, but rather, as we conceive, to such as have been hinted at above, and are necessarily, in a great degree, common to all pastoral states of society, in all times and in all countries.

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When we consider the genius of Burns, we see it manifestly moulded and coloured by his agricultural life. We see in all his earliest poems-and they are by far his finest a noble soul struggling-labouring with a hard and oppressive fate. He was, from very boy-hood, a toil-worn cottar," -and it was the aim of his noble heart to preserve that dignity which nature gave it, unshaken and unhumbled by the " weary weight" of his lot. His genius was winged by independence and in the proud disdain with which he spurned at the fortune that in vain strove to enslave him, it seemed as if his soul rose to a nobler pitch of enthusiasm, and that he more passionately enjoyed his freedom when feeling circled, not bound by unavailing chains.

The hardships and privations that Burns early felt himself born to endure, the constant presence before him of the image of poverty-the conviction of the necessary evils of the poor man's lot-made his whole heart to leap within him when joy, and pleasure, and happiness, opened their arms to receive him. Bliss bursts upon him like a rush of waters and his soul is at once swept down the flood. Every one must have felt that there is a melancholy air spread over his poetry as if his creed truly were "that man was made to mourn;" but sudden flashings and illuminations of delight are for ever breaking out; and in the vehemence, and energy, and triumphant exultation of his language in those moments of inspiration, we feel how dear a thing free and unmingled happiness is to the children of poverty and sorrow.

It was thus that the calamities of a life of hardship, that bows down or

dinary spirits to the earth, elevated and sublimed the genius and character of our immortal poet. It was thus that nothing seemed worthy to engross his attention, but the feelings and the passions of the heart of man. He felt within him visitings of thoughts that wafted him into Elysium,-he recognised in those thoughts the awful power of human passion,—and saw that, circumscribed as the sphere was in which he, a poor peasant, was placed, he might yet walk in it with power and glory, and that he might waken up into strength, freshness, and beauty, those feelings of his lowly brethren that destiny had enfeebled and obscured, and give them an existence in poetry, essentially true to human life, but tinged with that adorning radiance, which emanates only from the poet's soul in the hour of his inspiration.

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It is here that we must seek for the true cause of Burns' very limited power of description of external Nature. Certainly, of all poets of the first order, he is the one that has left us the fewest fine pictures of landscape. His senses were gratified with the forms, the blooms, and the odours of nature, and often in the fulness of his convivial delight, he pours out vivid expressions of that rapture and enjoyment. Butexternal nature seems never to have elevated his imagination, or for any length of time to have won him from the dominion of the living world. Where his eye reposed, or his ear listened, there too his soul was satisfied. When he has attempted to generalize, to delineate associations by which nature is connected with the universal feelings of our kind, he sinks to the level of an ordinary versifier. All that vivid and burning vigour, with which he describes his own feelings and passions as a human being in union with human beings, is gone at once; and we witness the unavailing labour of a mind endeavouring to describe what it but imperfectly understands, and but feebly enjoys. There is scarcely a line in his poems written in, or of the Highlands, that would startle us with surprise in the verses of the merest poetaster. His mind had never delivered itself up to such trains of thought. In his evening walks, after a day of toil, the murmur of the stream, the whispering of the breeze, or the song of the blackbird, touched his heart with joy,

and beautifully indeed has he blended his sweetest dreams of love and affection with such simple sounds as these ; but generally speaking, Nature had no charms for him, unless when she at once recalled to his memory, the image of some human being whom he loved, and the visions of departed happiness. Then indeed, insensate things became instinct with spirit, and spoke the passion of the poet's soul; of which there cannot be a finer instance than in the lines to" Mary in Heaven," when the trees, the banks, the streams, the channel of the Ayr, seem all parts of his own being, and the whole of that sylvan scenery is enveloped in an atmosphere of mournful passion.

We have frequently thought that it was fortunate for Burns, that he lived before this age of descriptive poetry, No doubt his original mind would have preserved him from servile imitation; but his admiration of the genius of his great, contemporaries might have seduced the train of his emotions from the fireside to the valley, and he might have wasted on the forms of external nature, much of that fervid passion which he has bestowed on the dearer and nearer objects of human love. Had he done so, he would have offered violence to his own soul; for it is plain that he never could have been a truly great poet, except as the low-born poet of lowly life, and that had he resigned any part of his empire over the passions of the human breast, he would have been but an inferior prince in the dominions of pure fancy. He was, in many respects, born at a happy time; happy for a man of genius like him, but fatal and hopeless to the mere common mind. Much poetry existed in Scotland, but no poet. There was no lavish and prodigal applause of great public favourites, no despotical criticism stretching the leaden sceptre of command over the free thoughts of genius. There were in our popular poetry many exquisite fragments struck off as it were from the great mass of domestic life; many pictures of unfinished, but touching beauty. There was every thing to stimulate, awaken, and excite, little or nothing to depress or discourage. A whole world of life lay before Burns, whose inmost recesses, and darkest nooks, and sunniest eminence he had familiarly trodden from his childhood. All that world, he felt, could be made

his own. No conqueror had overrun its fertile provinces, and it was for him to be crowned supreme over all the

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Lyrical singers of that high-souled land.”

The crown that he has won can never be removed from his head. Much is yet left for other poets, even among that life where the spirit of Burns delighted to work ;-but he has built monuments on all the high places, and they who follow can only hope to leave behind them some far humbler memorials.

We have said that there is necessarily less enthusiasm, and therefore less superstition in an agricultural than a pastoral country. Accordingly, in the poetry of Burns, there is not much of that wild spirit of fear and mystery which is to be found in the traditions of the south of Scotland. The "Hallowe'en" is a poem of infinite spirit and vivacity, that brings vividly before us all the merriment of the scene. But there is little or nothing very poetical in the character of its superstitions, and the poet himself, whose imagination seems never to have been subjected beneath the sway of any creatures but those of flesh and blood, treats the whole subject with a sarcastic good-humour, and sees in it only the exhibition of mere human feelings, and passions, and characters. Even in " Tam o' Shanter" the principal power lies in the character and situation of that "drowthy" hero; the Devil himself, playing on his bag-pipes in the window-neuk, is little more than a human piper, rather more burly than common; and while the witches and warlocks are mere old men and women, who continue to dance after

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jigging-time is o'er," the young witch, with the sark of se'enteen hunder linnen," is a buxom country lass to all intents and purposes, and considered by "Tam" in a very alluring but very simple and human light.

"Weel done, cutty sark!"

The description of the horrors of the scene has always seemed to us overcharged, and caricatured so as to become shocking rather than terrible. One touch of Shakspeare's imagination is worth all that laborious and heavy accumulation of affrightments.

But we are not now seeking to paint a picture of Burns' genius-we aim

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