The Canongate Burns. Robert Burns

An’ drink his health in auld Nanse Tinnock’s12 old

      Nine times a-week,

      125 If he some scheme, like tea an’ winnocks, windows

      Wad kindly seek. would

      Could he some commutation broach,

      I’ll pledge my aith in guid braid Scotch, oath, good broad

      He needna fear their foul reproach need not

      130 Nor erudition,

      Yon mixtie-maxtie, queer hotch-potch, mixed up

      The Coalition.

      Auld Scotland has a raucle tongue; old, rough

      She’s just a devil wi’ a rung; bludgeon

      135 An’ if she promise auld or young old

      To tak their part,

      Tho’ by the neck she should be strung,

      She’ll no desert.

      And now, ye chosen FIVE AND FORTY,

      140 May still your Mither’s heart support ye; mother’s

      Then, tho’ a Minister grow dorty, haughty

      An’ kick your place,

      Ye’ll snap your fingers, poor an’ hearty,

      Before his face.

      145 God bless your Honors, a’ your days,

      Wi’ sowps o’ kail and brats o’ claes, sups of broth, coarse cloth

      In spite o’ a’ the thievish kaes, jackdaws

      That haunt St. Jamie’s! parliament

      Your humble Bardie sings an’ prays,

      150 While Rab his name is.

      POSTSCRIPT

      Let half-starv’d slaves in warmer skies,

      See future wines, rich-clust’ring, rise;

      Their lot auld Scotland ne’er envies, old

      But, blythe and frisky,

      155 She eyes her freeborn, martial boys

      Tak aff their Whisky. drink down

      What tho’ their Phoebus kinder warms, sun

      While Fragrance blooms and Beauty charms!

      When wretches range, in famish’d swarms,

      160 The scented groves,

      Or hounded forth, dishonor arms

      In hungry droves.

      Their gun’s a burden on their shouther; shoulder

      They downa bide the stink o’ powther; do not, gun powder

      165 Their bauldest thought’s a hank’ring swither boldest, uncertain doubt

      To stan’ or rin,

      Till skelp – a shot – they’re aff, a’ throw’ther, crack, off, pell-mell

      To save their skin.

      But bring a SCOTCHMAN frae his hill, from

      170 Clap in his cheek a Highlan gill, gill (measure)

      Say, such is royal GEORGE’S will,

      An’ there’s the foe!

      He has nae thought but how to kill no

      Twa at a blow. two

      175 Nae cauld, faint-hearted doubtings tease him; no cold

      Death comes, wi’ fearless eye he sees him;

      Wi’ bluidy han’ a welcome gies him; bloody hand, gives

      An’ when he fa’s, falls

      His latest draught o’ breathin lea’es him leaves

      180 In faint huzzas.

      Sages their solemn een may steek eyes, close

      An’ raise a philosophic reek, smoke

      An’ physically causes seek,

      In clime an’ season;

      185 But tell me Whisky’s name in Greek:

      I’ll tell the reason.

      SCOTLAND, my auld, respected Mither! old, mother

      Tho’ whyles ye moistify your leather, moisten, vagina

      Till whare ye sit on craps o’ heather crops

      190 Ye tine your dam, lose your water

      Freedom and whisky gang thegither, go together

      Tak aff your dram! raise up your glass

      The extended title which conveys the notion of self-mocking very minor prophetic biblical lamentation and political tract is given, by the parodic use in Milton, an added impulse to see the poem, despite its manifest political content, as laughing and lightweight. Surely the poet, unlike Adam for Eve, is not grieving for a fallen Scotland (Paradise Lost, Book IX, ll. 896–901)? The political, economic occasion for the poem was the Wash Act brought in by English pressure in 1784 to prevent what they considered preferential treatment to the Scottish distilling industry. This had not only severe effects on the Scottish whisky industry but was in breach of the terms of the Union and, for Burns, another symptom of the London Parliament’s, at best, indifference to Scottish needs. By the time the poem appeared the injustice seemed, as Burns’s footnote suggests, to have been corrected: ‘This was wrote before the Act anent the Scotch Distilleries of session 1786; for which Scotland and the Author return their most grateful thanks.’

      In February, 1789, the matter flared up again. On this occasion Burns chose for the second time to send a pseudonymous letter to the Edinburgh Evening Courant on the 9th February. The occasion for his first letter had been his request for compassion for the fallen House of Stuart along with his risky defence of the American Revolution as akin to the British events of 1688. This second letter was signed John Barleycorn and purports, remarkably, to be written on behalf of the Scottish Distillers to William Pitt who, at the time of composition, appears to be about to fall from power due to the Regency Bill as an antidote to the King’s madness. The letter is based on the Scottish Distillers’ alleged mutual sense of falling with Pitt from power and prosperity to exclusion and poverty. There is also an extraordinary parallel made with King Nebuchadnezzar which is implicitly to be read as Burns’s own sense of sharing Pitt’s exile. The letter also repeats the poem’s allegations of political injustice to Scotland:

      But turn your eyes, Sir, to the tragic scenes of our fate. An ancient nation that for many ages had gallantly maintained the unequal struggle for independence with her much more powerful neighbour, at last agrees to a union which should ever after make them one people. In consideration of certain circumstances, it was solemnly covenanted that the Former should always enjoy a stipulated alleviation of her share of the public burdens, particularly in that branch of the revenue known by the name of the Excise.

      This just priviledge has of late given great umbrage to some invidious powerful individuals of the more potent half of the Empire, and they have spared no wicked pains, under insidious pretexts to subvert, what they yet too much dreaded the spirit of their ancient enemies openly to attack.

      By this conspiracy we fell; nor did we alone suffer, our Country was deeply wounded. A number of, we will say it, respectable characters largely engaged in trade where we were not only useful but absolutely necessary to our Country in her dearest interest; we, with all that was near and dear to us, were sacrificed without remorse, to the Infernal Deity of Political Expediency (Letter, 311).

      Burns’s