You see, my dear Sir, what a punctual correspondent I am; though, indeed, you may thank yourself for the tedium of my letters, as you have so flattered me on my horsemanship with my favourite hobby, and have praised the grace of his ambling so much, that I am scarcely ever off his back. For instance, this morning, though a keen blowing frost, in my walk before breakfast, I finished my duet, which you were pleased to praise so much. Whether I have uniformly succeeded, I will not say; but here it is for you, though it is not an hour old.
O Philly, happy be the day.[271]
Tell me honestly how you like it, and point out whatever you think faulty.
I am much pleased with your idea of singing our songs in alternate stanzas, and regret that you did not hint it to me sooner. In those that remain, I shall have it in my eye. I remember your objections to the name Philly, but it is the common abbreviation of Phillis. Sally, the only other name that suits, has to my ear a vulgarity about it, which unfits it, for anything except burlesque. The legion of Scottish poetasters of the day, whom your brother editor, Mr. Ritson, ranks with me as my coevals, have always mistaken vulgarity for simplicity; whereas, simplicity is as much eloignée from vulgarity on the one hand, as from affected point and puerile conceit on the other.
I agree with you as to the air, “Craigieburn-wood,” that a chorus would, in some degree, spoil the effect, and shall certainly have none in my projected song to it. It is not, however, a case in point with “Rothemurche;” there, as in “Roy’s Wife of Aldivalloch,” a chorus goes, to my taste, well enough. As to the chorus going first, that is the case with “Roy’s Wife,” as well as “Rothemurche.” In fact, in the first part of both tunes, the rhythm is so peculiar and irregular, and on that irregularity depends so much of their beauty, that we must e’en take them with all their wildness, and humour the verse accordingly. Leaving out the starting note in both tunes, has, I think, an effect that no regularity could counterbalance the want of.
Try, {Oh Roy’s wife of Aldivalloch.
{O lassie wi’ the lint-white locks.
and
compare with {Roy’s wife of Aldivalloch.
{Lassie wi the lint-white locks.
Does not the lameness of the prefixed syllable strike you? In the last case, with the true furor of genius, you strike at once into the wild originality of the air; whereas, in the first insipid method, it is like the grating screw of the pins before the fiddle is brought into tune. This is my taste; if I am wrong, I beg pardon of the cognoscenti.
“The Caledonian Hunt” is so charming, that it would make any subject in a song go down; but pathos is certainly its native tongue. Scottish bacchanalians we certainly want, though the few we have are excellent. For instance, “Todlin hame,” is, for wit and humour, an unparalleled composition; And “Andrew and his cutty gun” is the work of a master. By the way, are you not quite vexed to think that those men of genius, for such they certainly were, who composed our fine Scottish lyrics, should be unknown? It has given me many a heart-ache. Apropos to bacchanalian songs in Scottish, I composed one yesterday, for an air I like much—“Lumps o’ pudding.”