XXIII.
THE HENPECKED HUSBAND.
[A lady who expressed herself with incivility about her husband’s potations with Burns, was rewarded by these sharp lines.]
Curs’d be the man, the poorest wretch in life,
The crouching vassal to the tyrant wife!
Who has no will but by her high permission;
Who has not sixpence but in her possession;
Who must to her his dear friend’s secret tell;
Who dreads a curtain lecture worse than hell!
Were such the wife had fallen to my part,
I’d break her spirit, or I’d break her heart;
I’d charm her with the magic of a switch,
I’d kiss her maids, and kick the perverse b——h.
XXIV.
WRITTEN AT INVERARY.
[Neglected at the inn of Inverary, on account of the presence of some northern chiefs, and overlooked by his Grace of Argyll, the poet let loose his wrath and his rhyme: tradition speaks of a pursuit which took place on the part of the Campbell, when he was told of his mistake, and of a resolution not to be soothed on the part of the bard.]
Whoe’er he be that sojourns here,
I pity much his case,
Unless he’s come to wait upon
The Lord their God, his Grace.