Robert Burns | Page 8

that formed the climax of his career. But no detailed
knowledge of circumstances is necessary to rouse interest in a man who
wrote like that. You may be offended by the
self-consciousness and
the swagger, or you may be charmed by the frankness and dash, but
you can not remain indifferent. Burns had many moods besides those
reflected in these sentences, but here we can see as vividly as in any of
his poetry the fundamental characteristics of the man--sensitive,
passionate, independent, and as proud as Lucifer--whose life and work
are the subject of this volume.
0. Alloway, Mount Oliphant, and Lochlea
William Burnes, the father of the poet, came of a family of farmers and
gardeners in the county of Kincardine, on the east coast of Scotland. At
the age of twenty-seven, he left his native district for the south; and
when Robert, his eldest child, was born on January 25, 1759, William
was employed as gardener to the provost of Ayr. He had besides leased
some seven acres of land, of which he planned to make a nursery and
market-garden, in the neighboring parish of Alloway; and there near the
Brig o' Doon built with his own hands the clay cottage now known to
literary pilgrims as the birthplace of Burns. His wife, Agnes Brown, the
daughter of an Ayrshire farmer, bore him, besides Robert, three sons
and three daughters. In order to keep his sons at home instead of
sending them out as farm-laborers, the elder Burnes rented in 1766 the
farm of Mount Oliphant, and stocked it on borrowed money. The
venture did not prosper, and on a change of landlords the family fell
into the hands of a merciless agent, whose bullying the poet later
avenged by the portrait of the factor in _The Twa Dogs_.
I've noticed, on our Laird's court-day,--
And mony a time my heart's
been wae,--
Poor tenant bodies, scant o' cash,
How they maun thole
a factor's snash;
He'll stamp and threaten, curse and swear,
He'll

apprehend them, poind their gear;
While they maun stan', wi' aspect
humble,
And hear it a', and fear and tremble!
In 1777 Mount Oliphant was exchanged for the farm of Lochlea, about
ten miles away, and here William Burnes labored for the rest of his life.
The farm was poor, and with all he could do it was hard to keep his
head above water. His health was failing, he was harassed with debts,
and in 1784 in the midst of a lawsuit about his lease, he died.
In spite of his struggle for a bare subsistence, the elder Burnes had not
neglected the education of his children. Before he was six, Robert was
sent to a small school at Alloway Mill, and soon after his father joined
with a few neighbors to engage a young man named John Murdoch to
teach their children in a room in the village. This arrangement
continued for two years and a half, when, Murdoch having been called
elsewhere, the father undertook the task of education himself. The
regular instruction was confined chiefly to the long winter evenings,
but quite as important as this was the intercourse between father and
sons as they went about their work.
"My father," says the poet's brother Gilbert, "was for some time almost
the only companion we had. He conversed familiarly on all subjects
with us, as if we had been men; and was at great pains, as we
accompanied him in the labours of the farm, to lead the conversation to
such subjects as might tend to increase our knowledge, or confirm our
virtuous habits. He borrowed Salmon's _Geographical Grammar_ for
us, and endeavoured to make us acquainted with the situation and
history of the different countries in the world; while, from a
book-society in Ayr, he procured for us Derham's _Physics and
Astro-Theology_, and Ray's _Wisdom of God in the Creation_, to give
us some idea of astronomy and natural history. Robert read all these
books with an avidity and industry scarcely to be equalled. My father
had been a subscriber to Stackhouse's _History of the Bible_ ...; from
this Robert collected a competent knowledge of ancient history; for no
book was so voluminous as to slacken his industry, or so antiquated as
to dampen his researches. A brother of my mother, who had lived with
us some time, and had learned some arithmetic by our winter evening's

candle, went into a book-seller's shop in Ayr to purchase the _Ready
Reckoner, or Tradesman's Sure Guide_, and a book to teach him to
write letters. Luckily, in place of the _Complete Letter-Writer_, he got
by mistake a small collection of letters by the most eminent writers,
with a few sensible directions for attaining an easy epistolary style.
This book was to Robert of the greatest consequence. It inspired him
with a