This wotye all whom it concerns,
I, Rhymer Robin, alias Burns,
October twenty-third,
A ne’er-to-be-forgotten day,
Saefar I sprackl’d up the brae,
I dinner’d wi’ a Lord.
I’ve been at drucken writers’ feasts,
Nay, been bitch-fou’mang godly priests-
Wi’ rev’rence be it spoken!-
I’ve even join’d the honour’d jorum,
When mighty Squireships of the quorum,
Their hydra drouthdid sloken.
But wi’ a Lord!-stand out my shin,
A Lord-a Peer-an Earl’s son!
Up higher yet, my bonnet
An’ sica Lord!-lang Scoth ells twa,
Our Peerage he o’erlooks them a’,
As I look o’er my sonnet.
But O for Hogarth’s magic pow’r!
To show Sir Bardie’s willyartglow’r,
An’ how he star’d and stammer’d,
When, goavin, as if led wi’branks,
An’ stumpin on his ploughman shanks,
He in the parlour hammer’d.
I sidying shelter’d in a nook,
An’ at his Lordship steal’t a look,
Like some portentous omen;
Except good sense and social glee,
An'(what surpris’d me) modesty,
I marked nought uncommon.
I watch’d the symptoms o’the Great,
The gentle pride, the lordly state,
The arrogant assuming;
The fient apride, nae pride had he,
Nor sauce, nor state, that I could see,
Mairthan anhonest ploughman.
Then from his Lordship I shall learn,
Henceforth to meet with unconcern
One rank as weel’s another;
Naehonest, worthy man need care
To meet with noble youthful Daer,
For he butmeets a brother.