Volume V Part 9 (1/2)
THE MONTH OF JUNE.
O June, ye spring the loveliest flowers That a' our seasons yield; Ye deck sae flush the greenwood bowers, The garden, and the field; The pathway verge by hedge and tree, So fresh, so green, and gay, Where every lovely blue flower's e'e Is opening to the day.
The river banks and craggy peaks In wilding blossoms drest; With ivy o'er their jutting nooks Ye screen the ouzel's nest; From precipice, abrupt and bold, Your tendrils flaunt in air, With craw-flowers dangling living gold Ye tuft the steep brown scaur.
Your foliage shades the wild bird's nest From every prying e'e, With fairy fingers ye invest In woven flowers the lea; Around the lover's blissful hour Ye draw your leafy screen, And shade those in your rosy bower, Who love to muse unseen.
JOHN BURTT.
John Burtt was born about the year 1790, at Knockmarloch, in the parish of Riccarton, and county of Ayr. With a limited school education, he was apprenticed to a weaver in Kilmarnock; but at the loom he much improved himself in general scholars.h.i.+p, especially in cla.s.sical learning. In his sixteenth year he was decoyed into a s.h.i.+p of war at Greenock, and compelled to serve on board. Effecting his escape, after an arduous servitude of five years, he resumed the loom at Kilmarnock. He subsequently taught an adventure school, first in Kilmarnock, and afterwards at Paisley. The irksome labours of sea-faring life he had sought to relieve by the composition of verses; and these in 1816 he published, under the t.i.tle of ”Horae Poeticae; or, the Recreations of a Leisure Hour.” In 1817 he emigrated to the United States, where his career has been prosperous. Having studied theology at Princeton College, New Jersey, he became a licentiate of the Presbyterian Church, and was appointed to a ministerial charge at Salem. In 1831 he removed to Philadelphia, where he edited a periodical ent.i.tled the _Presbyterian_. Admitted in 1833 to a Presbyterian Church in Cincinnati, he there edited the _Standard_, a religious newspaper. In August 1835, he was promoted to a chair in the Theological Seminary of that place.
O'ER THE MIST-SHROUDED CLIFFS.[8]
AIR--_'Banks of the Devon.'_
O'er the mist-shrouded cliffs of the gray mountain straying, Where the wild winds of winter incessantly rave; What woes wring my heart while intently surveying The storm's gloomy path on the breast of the wave?
Ye foam-crested billows, allow me to wail, Ere ye toss me afar from my loved native sh.o.r.e; Where the flower which bloom'd sweetest in Coila's green vale, The pride of my bosom--my Mary 's no more.
No more by the banks of the streamlet we 'll wander, And smile at the moon's rimpled face in the wave; No more shall my arms cling with fondness around her, For the dew-drops of morning fall cold on her grave.
No more shall the soft thrill of love warm my breast-- I haste with the storm to a far distant sh.o.r.e, Where, unknown, unlamented, my ashes shall rest, And joy shall revisit my bosom no more.
FOOTNOTES:
[8] This song has been erroneously a.s.signed to Burns.
O! La.s.sIE, I LO'E DEAREST!
O! la.s.sie, I lo'e dearest!
Mair fair to me than fairest, Mair rare to me than rarest, How sweet to think o' thee.
When blythe the blue e'ed dawnin'
Steals saftly o'er the lawnin', And furls night's sable awnin', I love to think o' thee.
An' while the honey'd dew-drap Still trembles at the flower-tap, The fairest bud I pu't up, An' kiss'd for sake o' thee.
An' when by stream or fountain, In glen, or on the mountain, The lingering moments counting, I pause an' think o' thee.
When the sun's red rays are streamin', Warm on the meadow beamin', Or o'er the loch wild gleamin', My heart is fu' o' thee.