Note:

See the [note] to the previous poem. The line

'These pathways, yon far-stretching road!'

refers probably to the road to Brownhill, past Ellisland farmhouse where Burns lived. "The day following" would be Aug. 19th, 1803. The extract which follows from the Journal is a further illustration of the poem. August 8th.

"... Travelled through the vale of Nith, here little like a vale, it is so broad, with irregular hills rising up on each side, in outline resembling the old-fashioned valances of a bed. There is a great deal of arable land; the corn ripe; trees here and there—plantations, clumps, coppices, a newness in everything. So much of the gorse and broom rooted out that you wonder why it is not all gone, and yet there seems to be almost as much gorse and broom as corn; and they grow one among another you know not how. Crossed the Nith; the vale becomes narrow, and very pleasant; cornfields, green hills, clay cottages; the river's bed rocky, with woody banks. Left the Nith about a mile and a half, and reached Brownhill, a lonely inn, where we slept. The view from the windows was pleasing, though some travellers might have been disposed to quarrel with it for its general nakedness; yet there was abundance of corn. It is an open country—open, yet all over hills. At a little distance were many cottages among trees, that looked very pretty. Brownhill is about seven or eight miles from Ellisland. I fancied to myself, while I was sitting in the parlour, that Burns might have caroused there, for most likely his rounds extended so far, and this thought gave a melancholy interest to the smoky walls...."

On Dec. 23, 1839, Wordsworth wrote to Professor Henry Reed, Philadelphia:

"The other day I chanced to be looking over a MS. poem belonging to the year 1803, though not actually composed till many years afterwards. It was suggested by visiting the neighbourhood of Dumfries, in which Burns had resided, and where he died: it concluded thus:

'Sweet Mercy! to the gates of Heaven, etc.'

I instantly added, the other day,

'But why to Him confine the prayer, etc.'

The more I reflect upon this, the more I feel justified in attaching comparatively small importance to any literary monument that I may be enabled to leave behind. It is well however, I am convinced, that men think otherwise in the earlier part of their lives...."

'Sweet Mercy! to the gates of Heaven, etc.'