FROM "THE COTTAR"S SATURDAY NIGHT."
THE cheerfu" supper done, wi" serious face, They round the ingle form a circle wide;The sire turns o"er, wi" patriarchal grace, The big ha"-Bible, once his father"s pride: His bonnet reverently is laid aside,His lyart haffets wearin" thin and bare;Those strains that once did sweet in Zion glide, He wales a portion with judicious care;And "Let us worship God," he says, wi" solemn air……The priest-like father reads the sacred page, How Abraham was the friend of God on high;Or, Moses bade eternal warfare wage, With Amalek"s① ungracious progeny;②Or how the royal barddid groaning lie;
Beneath the stroke of Heaven"s avenging ire; Or, Job"s pathetic plaint and wailing cry;Or rapt Isaiah"s wild, seraphic fire;Or other holy seers that tune the sacred lyre.
Perhaps the Christian volume③ is the theme, -How guiltless blood for guilty man was shed;How He who bore in heaven the second name Had not on earth whereon to lay His head: How his first followers and servants sped;The precepts sage they wrote to many a land: How he, who lone in Patmos④ banished,Saw in the sun a mighty angel stand,And heard great Babylon"s doom pronounced by Heaven"s command.
Then kneeling down to heaven"s eternal King, The saint, the father, and the husband prays:
Hope "springs exulting⑤ on triumphant wing," That thus they all shall meet in future days;There ever bask in uncreated rays, No more to sigh, or shed the bitter tear,Together hymning their Creator"s praise, In such society, yet still more dear,While circling time moves round in an eternal sphere……Then homeward all take off their several way;The youngling cottagers retire to rest: The parent pair their secret homage pay,And proffer up to Heaven the warm request,That He who stills the raven"s clamorous nest,And decks the lily fair in flowery pride,Would, in the way his wisdom sees the best, For them and for their little ones provide;But chiefly in their hearts with grace divine preside.
- ROBERT BURNS
WORDS
avenging, retributive. circling, revolving. clamorous, noisy. followers, disciples. guiltless, sinless.
haffets, temples; sides of the head.
homage, devotion. hymning, singing. ingle, fire-place. judicious, sagacious. lyart, gray.
pathetic, touching.
patriarchal, paternal.
NOTES
precepts, maxims. proffer, offer. progeny, children.
pronounced, proclaimed. provide, furnish the means of life. reverently, devoutly.
seraphic, angelic. triumphant, exulting. ungracious, unfriendly. wales, selects.
wearin, turning.
youngling, very young.
① Amalek.-The Amalekites, who dwelt between the Dead Sea and the Red Sea, attacked the Israelites shortly after they had crossed the latter. (See Exodus , xvii. 8-16.)② The royal bard.-King David. (See 2 Samuel , xii.; and Psalm xxxii.)③ The Christian volume, the New Testament.
④ He, who lone in Patmos.-John, the apostle and evangelist, who wrote the Apocalypse in the Isle of Patmos.
⑤ "Springs exulting," &c.-From Pope"s Windsor Forest .