Whither, mad maiden, wilt thou roam? Far safer 'twere to stay at home; Where thou mayst sit, and piping, please The poor and private cottages. Since cotes and hamlets best agree...
Were I to give thee baptism, I would choose To christen thee, the bride, the bashful Muse, Or Muse of roses: since that name does fit Best with those virgin-verses thou hast writ:...
Tell that brave man, fain thou would'st have access To kiss his hands, but that for fearfulness; Or else because th'art like a modest bride, Ready to blush to death, should he but chide.
Since shed or cottage I have none, I sing the more, that thou hast one; To whose glad threshold, and free door I may a Poet come, though poor; And eat with thee a savoury bit,...
I've paid thee what I promis'd; that's not all; Besides I give thee here a verse that shall (When hence thy circummortal part is gone), Arch-like, hold up thy name's inscription....
The person crowns the place; your lot doth fall Last, yet to be with these a principal. Howe'er it fortuned; know for truth, I meant You a fore-leader in this testament.
Since now thou art about to leave Thy father's quiet house, And all the phantoms and illusions dear, That heaven-born fancies round it weave, And to this lonely region lend their charm,...
Go I must; when I am gone, Write but this upon my stone: Chaste I lived, without a wife, That's the story of my life. Strewings need none, every flower Is in this word, bachelour.
When after many lusters thou shalt be Wrapt up in sear-cloth with thine ancestry; When of thy ragg'd escutcheons shall be seen So little left, as if they ne'er had been;...
Tell me, young man, or did the Muses bring Thee less to taste than to drink up their spring, That none hereafter should be thought, or be A poet, or a poet-like but thee?...
Stand with thy graces forth, brave man, and rise High with thine own auspicious destinies: Nor leave the search, and proof, till thou canst find These, or those ends, to which thou wast design'd....
Nor is my number full till I inscribe Thee, sprightly Soame, one of my righteous tribe; A tribe of one lip, leaven, and of one Civil behaviour, and religion; A stock of saints, where ev'ry one doth wear...
By many a bard the Cameron clan is sung, Their march, their charge, their war cry, their array; Their laurels that from bloody fields have sprung, Where they have kept the sternest foes at bay. ...
Our Poet, who has taught the Western breeze To waft his songs before him o'er the seas, Will find them wheresoe'er his wanderings reach Borne on the spreading tide of English speech...
This life, dear Corry, who can doubt?-- Resembles much friend Ewart's[1] wine, When first the rosy drops come out, How beautiful, how clear they shine!...
Our dearest joys forever flow From fountains of the Long Ago, That from the heights of pleasures past Flood all the present valleys vast, And with eternal glees provide The future's endless ocean tide....
Kinsman beloved, and as a son, by me! When I behold the fruit of thy regard, The sculptured form of my old favourite bard, I reverence feel for him, and love for thee:...