ROBERT BURNS
(1759-1796)
BY RICHARD HENRY STODDARD
There have been, there are, and there always will be, poets concerning whose lives it is not necessary that the world should know anything in order to understand their poetry; and there have been, there are, and there always will be, other poets concerning whose lives it is necessary that the world should know all there is to be known, before it can begin to understand their poetry. The difference between these two classes of poets is the difference between a company of accomplished actors, who by virtue of their training and practice are able to project themselves into imaginary characters on the public stage, and the originals of these characters in private personal life; or to put it in other words, the difference between art and nature. It is the privilege of art to dispense with explanations and extenuations; for if it be true to itself it is sufficient in itself, and anything added to it or taken from it is an impertinence or a deformity. When we read 'Hamlet' and 'Lear,' or 'As You Like It' and 'Much Ado About Nothing,' we do not ask ourselves what Shakespeare meant by them,—why some scenes were written in verse and other scenes in prose,—for it is not of Shakespeare that we are thinking as we read, but of his characters, for whom we feel that he is no more responsible than we are, since they move, live, and have their being in a world of their own, above the smoke and stir of this dim spot which men call Earth,—the world of pure, perfect, poetic art. If Shakespeare was conscious of himself when he wrote, he succeeded in concealing himself so thoroughly that it is impossible to discover him in his writing,—as impossible as it is not to discover other poets in their writings; for whatever is absent from the choir of British song, the note of personality is always present there. A low laugh in the gracious mouth of Chaucer, a harsh rebuke on the stern lips of Milton, a modish sneer in the smile of Pope,—it was now a stifled complaint, now an amorous ditty, and now a riotous shout with Burns, who was as much a poet through his personality as through his genius. He put his life into his song; and not to know what his life was, is not to know what his song is,—why it was a consolation to him while he lived, and why after his death it made his—
"One of the few, the immortal names,
That were not born to die."
Early in the last half of the eighteenth century a staid and worthy man, named William Burness (as the name Burns was then spelled), a native of Kincardineshire, emigrated to Ayrshire in pursuit of a livelihood. He hired himself as a gardener to the laird of Fairlie, and later to a Mr. Crawford of Doonside, and at length took a lease of seven acres of land on his own account at Alloway on the banks of the Doon. He built a clay cottage there with his own hands, and to this little cottage, in December 1757, he brought a wife, the eldest daughter of a farmer of Carrick. There was a disparity in their ages, for he was about thirty-six and she some eight or nine years younger; and a disparity in their education, for he was an intelligent reader and lover of books, while she, though she had been taught as a child to read the Bible and to repeat the Psalms, was not able to write her name. She had a great respect for her husband, whose occupation was now that of a nurseryman. A little more than a year after their marriage, on the 25th of January, 1759, she bore him a son who was christened Robert, who was followed, as time went on, by brothers and sisters; and before many years were over, what with the guidman, the guidwife, and the bonny bairns, there was not much spare room in the little clay biggin at Alloway.
Poor as they were, the social condition of this Scottish family was superior to the social condition of most English families in the same walk of rustic life; this superiority resulting from certain virtues inherent in the national character,—the virtues of simple appetites and frugal habits, of patience and courage in adversity, and best of all, in affectionate hearts, reverential minds, and a thirst for knowledge which only books could supply. William Burness inherited respect for education from his father, who in his young manhood was instrumental in building a schoolhouse on his farm at Clockenhill. Accordingly, when his son Robert was in his sixth year he sent him to a little school at Alloway Mill, about a mile from his cottage; and not long after he took the lead in hiring a young teacher named Murdoch to instruct him and his younger brother Gilbert at some place near at hand. Their school-books consisted of the Shorter Catechism, the Bible, the spelling-book, and Fisher's 'English Grammar.' Robert was a better scholar than Gilbert, especially in grammar, in which he acquired some proficiency. The only book which he is known to have read outside of his primitive curriculum was a 'Life of Hannibal,' which was loaned him by his teacher. When he was seven the family removed to a small upland farm called Mount Oliphant, about two miles from Alloway, to and from which the boys plodded daily in pursuit of learning. At the end of two years the teacher obtained a better situation in Carrick; the school was broken up, and from that time onward William Burness took upon himself the education of his lads and lassies, whom he treated as if they were men and women, conversing with them on serious topics as they accompanied him in his labors on the farm, and borrowing for their edification, from a Book Society in Ayr, solid works like Derham's 'Physico- and Astro-Theology' and Ray's 'Wisdom of God in the Creation.' This course of heavy reading was lightened by the 'History of Sir William Wallace,' which was loaned to Robert by a blacksmith named Kilpatrick, and which forced a hot flood of Scottish feeling through his boyish veins. His next literary benefactor was a brother of his mother, who while living for a time with the family had learned some arithmetic by their winter evening's candle. He went one day into a bookseller's shop in Ayr to purchase a Ready Reckoner and a Complete Letter-Writer, but procured by mistake in place of the latter a small collection of 'Letters by Eminent Wits,' which proved of more advantage (or disadvantage) to his nephew than to himself, for it inspired the lad with a desire to excel in epistolary writing. Not long after this Robert's early tutor Murdoch returned to Ayr, and lent him Pope's Works; a bookish friend of his father's obtained for him the reading of two volumes of Richardson's 'Pamela' and another friendly soul the reading of Smollett's 'Ferdinand Count Fathom,' and 'Peregrine Pickle.' The book which most delighted him, however, was a collection of English songs called 'The Lark.'