The Canongate Burns

by Robert Burns

  On sic a day! such

  But hark! the tent has chang’d its voice;

  There’s peace an’ rest nae langer; no longer

  120 For a’ the real judges rise,

  They canna sit for anger: cannot

  Smith opens out his cauld harangues, cold

  On practice and on morals;

  An’ aff the godly pour in thrangs, off, groups

  125 To gie the jars an’ barrels give

  A lift that day. to drink

  What signifies his barren shine,

  Of moral pow’rs an’ reason;

  His English style, an’ gesture fine

  130 Are a’ clean out o’ season.

  Like SOCRATES or ANTONINE,

  Or some auld pagan heathen, old

  The moral man he does define,

  But ne’er a word o’ faith in

  135 That’s right that day.

  In guid time comes an antidote good

  Against sic poison’d nostrum; such, preaching

  For Peebles, frae the water-fit, from, mouth of the river

  Ascends the holy rostrum:

  140 See, up he’s got the Word o’ God,

  An’ meek an’ mim has view’d it,

  While COMMON-SENSE has taen the road,

  An’ aff, an’ up the Cowgate1

  Fast, fast that day.

  145 Wee Miller niest, the Guard relieves, next

  An’ Orthodoxy raibles, recites by rote

  Tho’ in his heart he weel believes, well

  An’ thinks it auld wives’ fables: old

  But faith! the birkie wants a Manse: fellow

  150 So, cannilie he hums them; carefully he humbugs

  Altho’ his carnal Wit an’ Sense

  Like hafflins-wise o’ercomes him almost half-wise

  At times that day.

  Now butt an’ ben the Change-house fills, every corner of the Ale House

  155 Wi’ yill-caup Commentators: ale cup

  Here’s crying out for bakes an’ gills, biscuits

  An’ there the pint-stowp clatters; pint-jug slams

  While thick an’ thrang, an’ loud an’ lang, crowded, long

  Wi’ Logic an’ wi’ Scripture,

  160 They raise a din, that, in the end noise

  Is like to breed a rupture

  O’ wrath that day.

  Leeze me on Drink! it gies us mair my blessings, gives, more

  Than either School or Colledge;

  165 It kindles Wit, it waukens Lear, wakens learning

  It pangs us fou o’ Knowledge: crams, full

  Be’t whisky-gill or penny wheep, small beer costing a penny

  Or onie stronger potion, any

  It never fails, on drinkin deep,

  170 To kittle up our notion, enliven spirits

  By night or day.

  The lads an’ lasses, blythely bent

  To mind baith saul an’ body, both soul

  Sit round the table, weel content, well

  175 An’ steer about the Toddy: stir

  On this ane’s dress, an’ that ane’s leuk, one’s, look

  They’re makin observations;

  While some are cozie i’ the neuk, cosy, corner

  An’ formin assignations

  180 To meet some day.

  But now the Lord’s ain trumpet touts, own, sounds

  Till a’ the hills are rairan, roaring back the echo

  And echoes back return the shouts;

  Black Russell is na spairan: not sparing

  185 His piercin words, like Highlan’ swords,

  Divide the joints an’ marrow;

  His talk o’ Hell, whare devils dwell, where

  Our vera ‘Sauls does harrow’2 very souls

  Wi’ fright that day.

  190 A vast, unbottom’d, boundless Pit,

  Fill’d fou o’ lowan brunstane, full, flaming brimstone

  Whase ragin flame, an’ scorchin heat, whose

  Wad melt the hardest whun-stane! would, whinstone

  The half-asleep start up wi’ fear,

  195 An’ think they hear it roaran; roaring

  When presently it does appear,

  ’Twas but some neebor snoran neighbour, snoring

  Asleep that day.

  ’Twad be owre lang a tale to tell, over long

  200 How monie stories past; many

  An’ how they crouded to the yill, crowded, ale

  When they were a’ dismist;

  How drink gaed round, in cogs an’ caups, went, wooden jugs, cups

  Amang the furms an’ benches; among, a row of seats

  205 An’ cheese an’ bread, frae women’s laps, from

  Was dealt about in lunches,

  An’ dawds that day. large pieces

  In comes a gausie, gash Guidwife, jolly, smart, good-

  An’ sits down by the fire,

  210 Syne draws her kebbuck an’ her knife; then, cheese

  The lasses they are shyer:

  The auld Guidmen, about the grace, old, good-

  Frae side to side they bother; from

  Till some ane by his bonnet lays, one, cap

  215 An’ gies them’t, like a tether, gives, rope

  Fu’ lang that day. long

  Waesucks! for him that gets nae lass, Alas!, no

  Or lasses that hae naething! have nothing

  Sma’ need has he to say a grace,

  220 Or melvie his braw claithing! dirty with meal, fine clothes

  O Wives, be mindfu’, ance yoursel, once

  How bonie lads ye wanted; handsome

  An’ dinna for a kebbuck-heel do not, hard cheeese rind

  Let lasses be affronted

  225 On sic a day! such

  Now Clinkumbell,3 wi’ rattlan tow, noisy pull

  Begins to jow an’ croon; swing, toll

  Some swagger hame the best they dow, home, can

  Some wait the afternoon.

  230 At slaps the billies halt a blink, a dyke gap, young lads

  Till lasses strip their shoon: take off, shoes

  Wi’ faith an’ hope, an’ love an’ drink,

  They’re a’ in famous tune

  For crack that day. talk

  235 How monie hearts this day converts many

  O’ Sinners and o’ Lasses!

  Their hearts o’ stane, gin night, are gane stone, come, gone

  As saft as onie flesh is: soft, any

  There’s some are fou o’ love divine; full

  240 There’s some are fou o’ brandy; full

  An’ monie jobs that day begin, many

  May end in Houghmagandie sexual intercourse

  Some ither day. other

  This celebration of the sensual capacity of the Scottish people to resist the worst rhetorical excesses of their clerical masters was written in 1785 and revised in early 1786 for the Kilmarnock edition. As McGuirk notes it is a direct descendent of Fergusson’s Leith Races which itself descends from Milton’s L’Allegro and the nine-line Scottish medieval ‘brawl’ poem:

  I dwall amang the caller springs

  That weet the Land o’ Cakes,

  And aften tune my canty strings

  At bridals and late-wakes.

  They ca’ me Mirth; I ne’er was kend

  To grumble or look sour,

  But blyth was be to lift a lend,

  Gif ye was sey my pow’r

  An’ pith this day.

  Fergusson’s poem is, of course, the celebration of a purely secular occasion; Burns is writing a more complex religious satire. Crawford (Burns, A Study of the Poems and Songs, p. 69) places the occasional poem accurately in the long Covenanter-originated Scottish tradition of open-air preaching. This specific event held in Mauchline in 1785 gathered together an audience of 2000 (four times the Mauchline population) of whom 1200 were communicants. Gilbert recorded that his brother was witness to this and had personal knowledge of the preachers he so incisively satirises.

  Bur
ns takes his epigraph from Hypocrisy A-La-Mode, a play written in 1704 by Tom Brown. That gale of liberal, satirical, enlightened laughter that runs through eighteenth-century English literature, especially Henry Fielding, as it attempts to sweep away institutionalised religious hypocrisy also blows powerfully through Burns’s writings. He is the major Scottish variant on this anti-clerical Enlightenment project. His Scotland, however, was a darker, more theocratically-controlled state than almost anywhere else in Europe. In his early writing, as here, he senses victory over the savage forces of religious repression. Later, his mood was to darken as he despaired of the unbreakable grip Calvin’s damnation had on the Scottish psyche and, hence, body politic.

  This early poem has, however, the comic optimism of Fielding’s Tom Jones rather than the demonic repression of Blake’s The Songs of Experience. The roaring flames of hell here (ll. 190–8) are merely the snores of a fellow pew-member. Unlike Macbeth, who tragically meets three witches on the moor, our comic narrator meets only two, Superstition and Hypocrisy, but their gorgeous sister Fun is an immediately victorious Cinderella and her spirit drives the whole poem. If not promiscuous, Fun is a decidedly erotic young lady as are the young women running barefoot, to save their shoes, towards the thronging excitement and carrying gifts which might be for the satisfaction of appetites other than those of the stomach. Indeed, the whole poem is infused with the way in which the people convert the ‘Occasion’, so clerically defined, into an opportunity for their multiple, but especially sexual, appetites:

  O happy is that man an’ blest!

  Nae wonder that it pride him!

  Whase ain dear lass, that he likes best,

  Comes clinkan down beside him!

  This echo of Psalm 46 also alerts us to the fact that the rhetorical world of these preachers breeds sexual ills. For example, in 1.116, ‘cantharidian plaisters’ were poultices made from the aphrodisiac Spanish fly.

  Burns’s assault on the various masters of pulpit oratory names names in a way that ensured there would be a severe backlash against him. ‘Sawney’ Moodie, with his old-time, ‘Auld-Licht’ undiluted gospel of damnation, is first on stage (ll. 100–17). Moodie (1728–99) was minister of Riccarton near Kilmarnock. He is followed by the ‘New Licht’ George Smith (d. 1823), minister of Galston. McGuirk subtly argues that while Burns is criticising Smith’s rhetorical banality, he is more intent on satirising the congregation whose appetite for hell-fire preaching excludes the life of actual good-works. Smith’s position is then assaulted by William Peebles of Newton-upon-Ayr (1753–1826) who, further inflaming the malign passions of the congregation, drives Common Sense, a central value of the new, more liberal Christianity, from the field. He is succeeded by Alexander Miller (d. 1804) whose professional self-seeking rebounded against him when the parishioners of Kilmaurs subsequently attempted to stop him getting that charge due, he claimed, to the effects of ll. 145–54. The worst is saved to the last. ‘Black’ John Russel (c. 1740–1817) was then minister at Kilmarnock. Subsequently minister at Cromarty, Hugh Miller (My Schools and Schoolmasters) testified to his capacity to terrify, indeed, traumatise his congregation.

  Along with such manifestations of theocratic control Burns adds some more overt political commentary. ‘Racer Jess’ is Janet Gibson (d. 1813), who is the daughter of Poosie Nansie, mine hostess of Love and Liberty, is with her like-inclined companions strategically placed beside the laird’s tent. In the same stanza, the ‘Wabster lads/ Blackguarding from Kilmarnock’ probably belong to the weaving community which was deeply and dissidently radical.

  The poem moves from a celebration of alcohol (ll. 163–71) and the triumph of this earthy spirit over the one of false sanctimony to a triumphant assertion, implicit throughout the poem, of spontaneous eroticism. The experienced women may already be dealing out more than bread and cheese but, assignations made, loss of virginity happily looms at the poem’s end. As Edwin Muir wrote, regarding the ‘sordid and general tyranny’ of the kirk session: ‘it is only necessary to say that the time-honoured Scottish tradition of fornication triumphantly survived all its terrors’ (John Knox, 1930, pp. 306–7).

  1 A street so called, which faces the tent in Mauchline. R.B.

  2 Shakespeare’s Hamlet, R.B. [Act I, Sc. 5].

  3 The Bell Ringer.

  Address to the Deil

  First printed in the Kilmarnock edition, 1786.

  O Prince! O Chief of many thronèd pow’rs!

  That led th’ embattl’d seraphim to war —

  Milton.

  O Thou! whatever title suit thee —

  Auld Hornie, Satan, Nick, or Clootie — old, cloven-hoofed

  Wha in yon cavern grim an’ sootie, who, filled with soot

  Clos’d under hatches,

  5 Spairges about the brunstane cootie, splashes, brimstone dish

  To scaud poor wretches! scald

  Hear me, auld Hangie, for a wee, old hangman, while

  An’ let poor damnèd bodies be;

  I’m sure sma’ pleasure it can gie, give

  10 Ev’n to a deil, devil

  To skelp an’ scaud poor dogs like me hit/slap, scald

  An’ hear us squeel!

  Great is thy pow’r an’ great thy fame;

  Far kend, an’ noted is thy name; known

  15 An’ tho’ yon lowan heugh’s thy hame, moaning, hollow, home

  Thou travels far;

  An’ faith! thou’s neither lag, nor lame, backward

  Nor blate nor scaur. bashful, afraid

  Whyles, ranging like a roarin lion, sometimes

  20 For prey, a’ holes an’ corners tryin;

  Whyles, on the strong-wing’d Tempest flyin,

  Tirlan the Kirks; stripping – attacking

  Whyles, in the human bosom pryin,

  Unseen thou lurks.

  25 I’ve heard my rev’rend Graunie say, grannie

  In lanely glens ye like to stray; lonely

  Or, where auld ruin’d castles grey old

  Nod to the moon,

  Ye fright the nightly wand’rer’s way

  30 Wi’ eldritch croon. unearthly eerie moan

  When twilight did my Graunie summon, grannie

  To say her pray’rs, douce, honest woman! sober/prudent

  Aft yont the dyke she’s heard you bumman, away beyond

  Wi’ eerie drone;

  35 Or, rustlin, thro’ the boortries coman, alder trees coming

  Wi’ heavy groan.

  Ae dreary, windy, winter night, one

  The stars shot down wi’ sklentan light, slanting

  Wi’ you mysel, I gat a fright: got

  40 Ayont the lough, beyond, loch

  Ye, like a rash-buss, stood in sight, bunch of rushes

  Wi’ waving sugh: moan

  The cudgel in my nieve did shake, fist

  Each bristl’d hair stood like a stake;

  45 When wi’ an eldritch, stoor quaick, quaick, unearthly harsh, duck quack

  Amang the springs, among

  Awa ye squatter’d like a drake, away, a noisy take-off

  On whistling wings.

  Let Warlocks grim, an’ wither’d Hags,

  50 Tell how wi’ you, on ragweed nags, ragwort

  They skim the muirs an’ dizzy crags, moors, high peaks

  Wi’ wicked speed;

  And in kirk-yards renew their leagues,

  Owre howket dead. over those raised from the grave

  55 Thence, countra wives, wi’ toil an’ pain, country

  May plunge an’ plunge the kirn in vain; churn

  For Och! the yellow treasure’s taen taken

  By witching skill;

  An’ dawtit, twal-pint Hawkie’s gaen petted, 12-pint cow has gone

  60 As yell’s the Bill. dry, bull

  Thence, mystic knots mak great abuse

  On Young-Guidmen, fond, keen an’ croose; husbands, over confident

  When the best warklum i’ the house, work-tool, penis

  By
cantraip wit, magic/evil

  65 Is instant made no worth a louse,

  Just at the bit. stopped before ejaculation

  When thowes dissolve the snawy hoord, thawes, snowy hoard

  An’ float the jinglin icy boord, water’s surface

  Then, Water-kelpies haunt the foord, imaginary water-spirits, ford

  70 By your direction,

  An’ nighted Trav’llers are allur’d

  To their destruction.

  An’ aft your moss-traversing Spunkies often, bog-, demons

  Decoy the wight that late an’ drunk is: fellow

  75 The bleezan, curst, mischievous monkies

  Delude his eyes,

  Till in some miry slough he sunk is, dirty hole

  Ne’er mair to rise. more

  When MASONS’ mystic word an’ grip

  80 In storms an’ tempests raise you up,

  Some cock or cat your rage maun stop, shall

  Or, strange to tell!

  The youngest Brother ye wad whip would

  Aff straught to Hell. off straight

  85 Lang syne in Eden’s bonie yard, long ago

  When youthfu’ lovers first were pair’d,

  An’ all the Soul of Love they shar’d,

  The raptur’d hour,

  Sweet on the fragrant flow’ry swaird, grassy edge

  90 In shady bow’r:

  Then you, ye auld, snick-drawing dog! old, sly door opener

  Ye cam to Paradise incog, came, disguised

  An’ play’d on man a cursed brogue trick

  (Black be your fa’!), fall

  95 An’ gied the infant warld a shog, gave, world, shake

  ’Maist ruin’d a’. almost

  D’ye mind that day when in a bizz flurry/bustle

  Wi’ reeket duds, an’ reestet gizz, smoky clothes, scorched wig

  Ye did present your smoutie phiz smutty face

  100 ’Mang better folk;

  An’ sklented on the man of Uzz squinted at Job

  Your spitefu’ joke?