Learn’d “vive la bagatelle et vive l’amour;”
     So travell’d monkeys their grimace improve,
     Polish their grin—­nay, sigh for ladies’ love! 
     His meddling vanity, a busy fiend,
     Still making work his selfish craft must mend.

* * * Crochallan came, The old cock’d hat, the brown surtout—­the same; His grisly beard just bristling in its might—­ ’Twas four long nights and days from shaving-night; His uncomb’d, hoary locks, wild-staring, thatch’d A head, for thought profound and clear, unmatch’d; Yet, tho’ his caustic wit was biting-rude, His heart was warm, benevolent and good.

     O Dulness, portion of the truly blest! 
     Calm, shelter’d haven of eternal rest! 
     Thy sons ne’er madden in the fierce extremes
     Of Fortune’s polar frost, or torrid beams;
     If mantling high she fills the golden cup,
     With sober, selfish ease they sip it up;
     Conscious the bounteous meed they well deserve,
     They only wonder “some folks” do not starve! 
     The grave, sage hern thus easy picks his frog,
     And thinks the mallard a sad worthless dog. 
     When disappointment snaps the thread of Hope,
     When, thro’ disastrous night, they darkling grope,
     With deaf endurance sluggishly they bear,
     And just conclude that “fools are Fortune’s care:” 
     So, heavy, passive to the tempest’s shocks,
     Strong on the sign-post stands the stupid ox.

     Not so the idle Muses’ mad-cap train,
     Not such the workings of their moon-struck brain;
     In equanimity they never dwell,
     By turns in soaring heaven, or vaulted hell!

Elegy On The Year 1788

     For lords or kings I dinna mourn,
     E’en let them die—­for that they’re born: 
     But oh! prodigious to reflec’! 
     A Towmont, sirs, is gane to wreck! 
     O Eighty-eight, in thy sma’ space,
     What dire events hae taken place! 
     Of what enjoyments thou hast reft us! 
     In what a pickle thou has left us!

     The Spanish empire’s tint a head,
     And my auld teethless, Bawtie’s dead: 
     The tulyie’s teugh ’tween Pitt and Fox,
     And ’tween our Maggie’s twa wee cocks;
     The tane is game, a bluidy devil,
     But to the hen-birds unco civil;
     The tither’s something dour o’ treadin,
     But better stuff ne’er claw’d a middin.

     Ye ministers, come mount the poupit,
     An’ cry till ye be hearse an’ roupit,
     For Eighty-eight, he wished you weel,
     An’ gied ye a’ baith gear an’ meal;
     E’en monc a plack, and mony a peck,
     Ye ken yoursels, for little feck!

     Ye bonie lasses, dight your e’en,
     For some o’ you hae tint a frien’;
     In Eighty-eight, ye ken, was taen,
     What ye’ll ne’er hae to gie again.