Like to mak vaistie wanes ;1
And round about him as a wheel,
Hang all in rumples2 to the heel
His kethat3 for the nanes.4

Mony proud trumpour with him trippit;
Through scaldand fire aye as they skippit,
They grinned with hideous granes.
Then Ire came in with sturt and strife;
His hand was aye upon his knife,
He brandished like a bear,
Boasters, braggarts, and bargainers,
After him, passit in to pairs,

All boden in 'feir of weir,' 5

In jacks, and scrips, and bonnets of steel;
Their legs were chained down to the heel;
Froward was their effeir:

Some upon other with brands beft,6

Some jaggit others, to the heft,

With knives that sharp could shear.

Next in the Dance followed Envy,
Filled full of feid and felony,

Hid malice and despite :

For privy hatred that traitor trembled;
Him followed mony freik dissembled,
With feigned wordis white:

And flatterers into men's faces;
And backbiters in secret places,

To lee that had delight;

And rouners of fals lesings,
Alas! that courts of noble kings
Of them can never be quit.

Next him in Dance came Covetice,
Root of all evil and grund of vice,
That never could be content:
Caitiffs, wretches, and ockerars,8
Hood-pykes, hoarders, and gatherers,
All with that warlock went:

Out of their throats they shot on other
Het molten gold, methought, a fother,10
As fire-flaught maist fervent;

Ay as they toomit them of shot,

Fiends filled them new up to the throat
With gold of all kind prent.11

Of Dunbar's moral poems the most solemn and impressive is the one in which he represents a Thrush and a Nightingale taking opposite sides in a debate upon earthly and spiritual affections, the Thrush ending

1 Something touching puffed-up manners appears to be hinted at in this obscure 2 Large folds.

line.

4 For the occasion.

• Gave blows.

9 Misers.

3 Robe.

5 Arrayed in the accoutrements of war.

7 Contentious persons.

10 Great quantity.

8 Usurers.

11 Every coinage.

every stanza with a recommendation of 'A lusty life in Love's service,' and the Nightingale with the more melodious declaration that 'All love is lost but upon God alone.' From this poem we present, with much pleasure, the following stanzas.

THE MERLE AND THE NIGHTINGALE.

In May, as that Aurora did upspring,
With crystal een chasing the cluddes sable,
I heard a Merle with merry notis sing

A sang of love, with voice right comfortable,
Again' the orient beamis, amiable,
Upon a blissful branch of laurel green;
This was her sentence sweet and delectable,
A lusty life in Lovis service been.

Under this branch ran down a river bright,

Of balmy liquor, crystalline of hue,
Again' the heavenly azure skyis light,
Where did upon the tother side pursue
A Nightingale, with sugared notis new,
Whose angel feathers as the peacock shone;
This was her song, and of a sentence true,
All love is lost but upon God alone.
With notis glad, and glorious harmony,
This joyful Merle, so salust she the day,
While rung the woodis of her melody,
Saying, Awake ye lovers of this May;
Lo, fresh Flora has flourished every spray,
As nature has her taught, the noble queen,
The field been clothit in a new array;

A lusty life in Lovis service been.

Ne'er sweeter noise was heard with living man,
Na made this merry gentle Nightingale;
Her sound went with the river as it ran,
Out through the fresh and flourished lusty vale;
O Merle quoth she, O fool! stint of thy tale,
For in thy song good sentence is there none,
For both is tint, the time and the travail
Of every love but upon God alone.

Cease, quoth the Merle, thy preaching, Nightingale:
Shall folk their youth spend into holiness?
Of young sanctis, grows auld feindis, but fable;

Fye, hypocrite, in yeiris tenderness,

Again' the law of kind thou goes express,

That crookit age makes one with youth serene,
Whom nature of conditions made diverse :
A lusty life in Lovis service been.

The Nightingale said, Fool, remember thee,
That both in youth and eild,' and every hour,
The love of God most dear to man suld be;
That him, of nought, wrought like his own figour,

1 Age.

1 Shown.

And died himself fro' dead him to succour;

O, whether was kythit1 there true love or none ?
He is most true and stedfast paramour,

And love is lost but upon him alone.

The Merle said, Why put God so great beauty
In ladies, with sic womanly having,

But gif he would that they suld lovit be?
To love eke nature gave them inclining,
And He of nature that worker was and king,
Would nothing frustir put, nor let be seen,
Into his creature of his own making;
A lusty life in Lovis service been.

The Nightingale said, Not to that behoof
Put God sic beauty in a lady's face,

That she suld have the thank therefor or luve,
But He, the worker, that put in her sic grace;
Of beauty, bounty, riches, time, or space,

And every gudeness that been to come or gone
The thank redounds to him in every place:
All love is lost, but upon God alone.

O Nightingale! it were a story nice,
That love suld not depend on charity;
And, gif that virtue contrar be to vice,
Then love maun be a virtue, as thinks me;

For, aye, to love envy maun contrar' be:

God bade eke love thy neighbour fro the spleen,2
And who than ladies sweeter neighbours be?

A lusty life in Lovis service been.

The Nightingale said, Bird, why does thou rave?
Man may take in his lady sic delight,

Him to forget that her sic virtue gave,

And for his heaven receive her colour white:

Her golden tressit hairis redomite,3

Like to Opollo's beamis tho' they shone,
Suld not him blind fro' love that is perfite;
All love is lost but upon God alone.

The Merle said, Love is cause of honour aye,
Love makis cowards manhood to purchase,
Love makis knichtis hardy at essay,

Love makis wretches full of largeness,

Love makis sweir folks full of business,

Love makis sluggards fresh and well be seen,
Love changes vice in virtuous nobleness;
A lusty life in Lovis service been.

The Nightingale said, True is the contrary;
Sic frustis love it blindis men so far,

Into their minds it makis them to vary;

In false vain glory they so drunken are,

3 Bound, encircled.

2 Equivalent to the modern phrase, from the heart. 4 Slothful.

Their wit is went, of woe they are not waur,
While that all worship away be fro' them gone,

Fame, goods, and strength; wherefore well say I daur,
All love is lost but upon God alone.

Then said the Merle, mine error I confess.

This frustis love is all but vanity:

Blind ignorance me gave sic hardiness,

To argue so again the verity;

Wherefore I counsel every man that he
With love not in the feindis net be tone,1

But love the love that did for his love die:

All love is lost but upon God alone.

Then sang they both with voices loud and clear,
The Merle sang, Man, love God that has thee wrought.
The Nightingale sang, Man, love the Lord most dear,

That thee and all this world made of nought.

The Merle said, love him that thy love has sought

Fro' heaven to earth, and here took flesh and bone.

The Nightingale sang, And with his dead thee bought:
All love is lost, but upon him alone.

Then flew thir birdis o'er the boughis sheen,

Singing of love amang the leavis small;

Whose eidant plead yet made my thoughtis grein,

Both sleeping, waking, in rest, and in travail :
Me to recomfort most it does avail,

Again for love, when love I can find none,

To think how sung this Merle and Nightingale ;

All love is lost but upon God alone.

To most readers there is something more touching in those less labored verses in which the poet moralizes on the brevity of existence, the shortness and uncertainty of all ordinary enjoyments, and the wickedness and woes of mankind, than in his more elaborate productions. From these poems we select the following specimen :

This wavering warld's wretchedness
The failing and fruitless business,
The misspent time, the service vain
For to consider is ane pain.

The sliding joy, the gladness short,
The feigned love, the false comfort,
The sweir abade,3 the slightful train,
For to consider is ane pain.

The suggared mouths, with minds therefra,
The figured speech, with faces tway;
The pleasing tongues with hearts in plain,
For to consider is ane pain.

Dunbar was, however, by no means disposed habitually to take gloomy

1 Ta'en, taken.

* Delay.

2 Whose close disputation yet moved my thoughts.

4 Snare.

or desponding views of life. He has one poem each stanza of which ends with

For to be blythe methinks it best;

and in another poem he advises, since life is so uncertain, that the good things of this world be rationally enjoyed while it is yet possible. In a third, these maxims are still more forcibly expressed; and from this we extract the following stanzas, the philosophy of which is excellent.

Be merry, man, and tak not sair in mind

The wavering of this wretched world of sorrow;

To God be humble, to thy friend be kind,

And with thy neighbours gladly lend and borrow;
His chance to-night, it may be thine to-morrow;
Be blyth in hearte for my aventure,

For oft with wise men it has been said aforow,
Without Gladness availes no Treasure.

Make thee gude cheer of it that God thee sends,
For warld's wrak but welfare1 nought avails;
Nae gude is thine save only that thou spends,
Remanant all thou bruikes but with bails;2
Seek to solace when sadness thee assails;
In dolour lang thy life may not endure.
Wherefore of comfort set up all thy sails;
Without gladness availes no Treasure.

Follow on pity, flee trouble and debate,
With famous folkis hald thy company;
Be charitable and hum'le in thine estate,
For warldly honour lastes but a cry.
For trouble in earth tak no melancholy;
Be rich in patience, if thou in gudes be poor;
Who lives merrily he lives mightily;

Without gladness availes no Treasure.

Dunbar was as great in the Comic as in the solemn strain, but unfortunately not so pure. Among his Comic poems there is one piece of peculiar humor, descriptive of an imaginary tournament between a Tailor and a Shoemaker in the same low regions where he places 'The Dance' of 'The Seven Deadly Sins.' It is written in the style of the broadest farce, and though the language is very often offensive, yet it is as droll as any thing in Smollett.

We have dwelt longer upon the life, genius, and writings of Dunbar than we had intended; but the greatest of Scotland's poets required something more than a mere passing notice.

GAVIN DOUGLAS, a contemporary of Dunbar was the youngest son of the sixth earl of Angus, and was born at Brechin 1471. He was educated at the university of St. Andrews, after which he travelled in Germany and

1 World's trash without health.

2 Injuries.