Did you not once propose “The sow’s tail to Geordie” as an air for your work? I am quite delighted with it; but I acknowledge that is no mark of its real excellence. I once set about verses for it, which I meant to be in the alternate way of a lover and his mistress chanting together. I have not the pleasure of knowing Mrs. Thomson’s Christian name, and yours, I am afraid, is rather burlesque for sentiment, else I had meant to have made you the hero and heroine of the little piece.
How do you like the following epigram which I wrote the other day on a lovely young girl’s recovery from a fever? Doctor Maxwell was the physician who seemingly saved her from the grave; and to him I address the following:
TO DR. MAXWELL,
ON MISS JESSIE STAIG’S RECOVERY.
Maxwell, if merit here you crave,
That merit I deny:
You save fair Jessy from the grave?—
An angel could not die!
God grant you patience with this stupid epistle!
R. B.