Some Characteristics of Robert Burns.

What characteristics that Burns had gained from his predecessors was a direct-speaking style, and to walk on his own feet instead of on academical stilts. There was never a man of letters with more absolute command of his means; and we may say of him, without excess, that his style was his slave. Hence that energy of epithet, so concise and telling, that a foreigner is tempted to explain it by some special richness or aptitude in the dialect he wrote. Hence the Homeric justness and completeness of description which gives us the very physiognomy of nature, in body and detail as nature is. Hence, too, the unbroken literary quality of his best pieces, which keeps him from any slip into the weariful trade of word-painting, and presents everything as everything should be presented by the art of words, in a clear, continuous medium of thought. Principal Shairp, for instance, gives us a paraphrase of one tough verse of the original; and for those who knew the Greek poets only by paraphrase, this has the very quality they are accustomed to look for and admire in Greek. The contemporaries of Burns were surprised that he should visit so many mountains and waterfalls, and not seize the opportunity to make a poem. Indeed, it is not for those who have a true command of the art of words, but for peddling professional amateurs that these pointed occasions are most useful and inspiring. As those who speak French imperfectly are glad to dwell on any topic they may have talked upon or heard others talk upon before, because they know appropriate words for it in French, so the dabbler in verse rejoices to behold a waterfall, because he has learned the sentiment, and knows appropriate words for it in poetry. But the dialect of Burns was fit to deal with any subject; and whether it was a stormy night, a shepherd's collie, a sheep struggling in the snow, the conduct of cowardly soldiers in the field, the gait and cogitations of a drunken man, or only a village cockcrow in the morning, he could find language to give it freshness, body, and relief, he was always ready to borrow the hint of a design, as though he had a difficulty in commencing—a difficulty, let us say, in choosing a subject out of a world which seemed all equally living and significant to him; but, once he had the subject chosen, he could cope with nature single-handed, and make every stroke a triumph. Again, his absolute mastery in his art enabled him to express each and all of his different humours, and to pass smoothly and congruously from one to another. Many men invent a dialect for page 10 only one side of their nature—perhaps their pathos or their humour, or the delicacy of their senses—and, for lack of a medium, leave all the others unexpressed. You meet such a one, and find him in con-versation full of thought, feeling, and experience, which he has lacked the art to employ in his writings. But Burns was not thus hampered in the practice of the literary art; he could throw the whole weight of his nature into his work, and impregnate it from end to end. If Dr. Johnson, that stilted and accomplished stylist, had lacked the sacred Boswell, what should we have known of him? and how should we have delighted in his acquaintance as we do? Those who spoke with Burns tell us how much we have lost who did not. But I think they exaggerate their privilege; I think we have the whole Burns in our possession set forth in his consumate verses.

It was by his style, and not by his matter, that he affected Words-worth and the world. There is, indeed, only one merit worth con-sidering in a man of letters—that he should write well; and only one damning fault—that he should write ill. We are little the better for the reflections of the sailor's parrot in the story. And so, if Burns helped to change the course of literary history, it was by his frank, direct, and masterly utterance, and not by his homely choice of subjects. That was imposed upon him, not chosen upon a principle. He wrote from experience, because it was his nature so to do, and the tradition of the school from which he proceeded was fortunately not opposed to homely subjects. But to these homely subjects he communicated the rich commentary of his nature—they were all steeped in Burns—and they interest us, not in themselves, but because they have passed through the spirit of so genuine and vigorous a man. Such is the stamp of living literature; and there was never any more alive than that of Burns.

What a gust of sympathy there is in him, sometimes flowing out in by-ways hitherto unused, upon mice, and flowers, and the devil himself; sometimes speaking plainly between human hearts; some-times ringing out in merry exhultation like a peal of bells! When we compare "The Farmer's Salutation to his Auld Mare Maggie" with a clever and inhuman production of half a century earlier, "The Auld Man's Mare's dead," we see in a nutshell the spirit of the change introduced by Burns. And as to its manner, who that has read it can forget how the collie Luath, in "The Twa Dogs," describes and enters into the merry-making in the cottage?

"The luntin' pipe an' sneeshin mill,
Are handed round wi' richt guid will;
The canty auld folks crackin' crouse,
The young anes rantin' through the house—
My heart has been sae fain to see them
That I for joy hae barkit wi' them."

It was this ardent power of sympathy that was fatal to so many women, and, through Jean Armour, to himself at last. His humour comes to him in a stream so deep and easy that I will venture to call him the best of humorous poets. He turns about in the midst to utter a noble sentiment or a trenchant remark on human life, and the style changes and rises to the occasion, I think it is Principal page 11 Shairp who says, happily, that Burns would have been no Scotchman if he had not loved to moralise; neither, may we add, would he have been his father's son; but (what is worthy of note) his moralisings are to a large extent the moral of his own career. He was among the least impersonal of artists. Except in "The Jolly Beggars," he shows no gleam of dramatic instinct. Mr. Carlyle had complained that "Tarn o' Shanter" is, from the absence of this quality, only a picture and external piece of work; and I may add that in "The Twa Dogs" it is precisely in the infringement of dramatic propriety that a great deal of the humour of the speeches depends for its existence and effect. Indeed, Burns was so full of his identity, that it breaks forth on every page; and there is scarce an appropriate remark, either in praise or blame of his own conduct, but he has put it himself into verse. Alas for the tenor of these remarks! They are indeed his own pitiful apology for such a marred existence, and talents so misused and stunted; and they seem to prove for ever how small a part is played by reason in the conduct of man's affairs. Here was one at least who with unfailing judgment predicted his own fate; yet his knowledge could not avail him, and with open eyes he must fulfil his tragic destiny.

Ten years before the end, he had written his epitaph; and neither subsequent events, not the critical eyes of posterity, have shown us a word in it to alter. And, lastly, has he not put in for himself the last unanswerable plea?—

"Then gently scan your brother man,
Still gentler sister woman;
Though they may gang a kennin wrang,
To step aside is human :
One point must still be greatly dark—"

One? Alas! I fear every man and woman of us is "greatly dark" to all their neighbours, from the day of birth until death removes them, in their greatest virtues as well as their saddest faults; and we, who have been trying to read the character of Burns, may take home the lesson and be gentle in our thoughts.—Cornhill.