Mild zephyrs waft thee to life’s farthest shore,
     Nor think of me and my distress more,—­
     Falsehood accurst!  No! still I beg a place,
     Still near thy heart some little, little trace: 
     For that dear trace the world I would resign: 
     O let me live, and die, and think it mine!

     “I burn, I burn, as when thro’ ripen’d corn
     By driving winds the crackling flames are borne;”
     Now raving-wild, I curse that fatal night,
     Then bless the hour that charm’d my guilty sight: 
     In vain the laws their feeble force oppose,
     Chain’d at Love’s feet, they groan, his vanquish’d foes. 
     In vain Religion meets my shrinking eye,
     I dare not combat, but I turn and fly: 
     Conscience in vain upbraids th’ unhallow’d fire,
     Love grasps her scorpions—­stifled they expire! 
     Reason drops headlong from his sacred throne,

     Your dear idea reigns, and reigns alone;
     Each thought intoxicated homage yields,
     And riots wanton in forbidden fields. 
     By all on high adoring mortals know! 
     By all the conscious villain fears below! 
     By your dear self!—­the last great oath I swear,
     Not life, nor soul, were ever half so dear!

Song—­She’s Fair And Fause

     She’s fair and fause that causes my smart,
     I lo’ed her meikle and lang;
     She’s broken her vow, she’s broken my heart,
     And I may e’en gae hang. 
     A coof cam in wi’ routh o’ gear,
     And I hae tint my dearest dear;
     But Woman is but warld’s gear,
     Sae let the bonie lass gang.

     Whae’er ye be that woman love,
     To this be never blind;
     Nae ferlie ‘tis tho’ fickle she prove,
     A woman has’t by kind. 
     O Woman lovely, Woman fair! 
     An angel form’s faun to thy share,
     ’Twad been o’er meikle to gi’en thee mair—­
     I mean an angel mind.

Impromptu Lines To Captain Riddell

     On Returning a Newspaper.

     Your News and Review, sir. 
     I’ve read through and through, sir,
     With little admiring or blaming;
     The Papers are barren
     Of home-news or foreign,
     No murders or rapes worth the naming.

     Our friends, the Reviewers,
     Those chippers and hewers,
     Are judges of mortar and stone, sir;
     But of meet or unmeet,
     In a fabric complete,
     I’ll boldly pronounce they are none, sir;

     My goose-quill too rude is
     To tell all your goodness
     Bestow’d on your servant, the Poet;
     Would to God I had one
     Like a beam of the sun,
     And then all the world, sir, should know it!

Lines To John M’Murdo, Esq.  Of Drumlanrig