Her ringlets are the gift o' nature,
Flowing gracefu' o'er her brow;
The turn, the hue o' ilka feature,
Form, and colour, nature drew.
She 's meikle sought, and meikle thought o',
Lang unwedded canna be;
Wi' kindness court the comely creature,
Cast the glaumrie o'er her e'e.
Have ye an ear can be delighted?
Like a seraph she can sing,
Wi' charming grace and witching manner,
Thrilling o'er the music string.
Her tell the tale that moves to pity,
But wi' heart and feeling speak;
Then watch the turn o' ilka feature,
Kiss the tear that weets her cheek.
She sooms na aye in silk or satin,
Flaunting like a modern belle;
Her robe and plaid 's the simple tartan,
Sweet and modest like hersel'.
The shapely robe adorns her person
That her eident hand wad sew;
The plaid sae graceful flung around her,
'Twas her tastefu' manner threw.
She 'll mak' a thrifty loving woman
To a kind weel-doing man,
Forby a tender-hearted mother—
Win the lassie if ye can.
For weel she 's worth your heart and treasure;
May your bridal day be near—
Then half a score o' bairns hereafter—
May ye live a hunder year.
HEW AINSLIE.
Hew Ainslie was born on the 5th April 1792, at Bargeny Mains, in the parish of Dailly, and county of Ayr. Receiving the rudiments of education from a private teacher in his father's house, he entered the parish school of Ballantrae in his tenth year, and afterwards became a pupil in the academy of Ayr. A period of bad health induced him to forego the regular prosecution of learning, and, having quitted the academy, he accepted employment as an assistant landscape gardener on the estate of Sir Hew Dalrymple Hamilton. At the age of sixteen he entered the writing chambers of a legal gentleman in Glasgow, but the confinement of the office proving uncongenial, he took a hasty departure, throwing himself on the protection of some relatives at Roslin, near Edinburgh. His father's family soon after removed to Roslin, and through the kindly interest of Mr Thomas Thomson, Deputy-Clerk Register, he procured a clerkship in the General Register House, Edinburgh. For some months he acted as amanuensis to Professor Dugald Stewart, in transcribing his last work for the press.
Having entered into the married state, and finding the salary of his office in the Register House unequal to the comfortable maintenance of his family, he resolved to emigrate to the United States, in the hope of bettering his circumstances. Arriving at New York in July 1822, he made purchase of a farm in that State, and there resided the three following years. He next made a trial of the Social System of Robert Owen, at New Harmony, but abandoned the project at the close of a year. In 1827 he entered into partnership with Messrs Price & Wood, brewers, in Cincinnati, and set up a branch of the establishment at Louisville. Removing to New Albany, Indiana, he there built a large brewery for a joint-stock company, and in 1832 erected in that place similar premises on his own account. The former was ruined by the great Ohio flood of 1832, and the latter perished by fire in 1834. He has since followed the occupation of superintending the erection of mills and factories; and has latterly fixed his abode in Jersey, a suburb of New York.
Early imbued with the love of song, Mr Ainslie composed verses when a youth on the mountains of Carrick. A visit to his native country in 1820 revived the ardour of his muse; and shortly before his departure to America, he published the whole of his rhyming effusions in a duodecimo volume, with the title, "Pilgrimage to the Land of Burns." A second volume from his pen, entitled, "Scottish Songs, Ballads, and Poems," was in 1855 published at New York.