Ye hazelly shaws and briery dens,
Ye burnies, wimplin' down your glens
Wi' toddlin' din,
Or foaming, strang, wi' hasty stens,
Frae linn to linn[1].
The same appeal forms the burden of his song on the 'Banks and braes o' bonnie Doon.' He leads us where
In gowany glens the burnie strays,
Or trots by hazelly shaws and braes,
Wi' hawthorns gray[2].
He pictures the stream after a rain-storm, when
Tumbling brown, the burn comes down,
And roars frae bank to brae[3];
or when the breath of the Atlantic has swept over the wintry hills and the
Burns wi' snawy wreeths up-choked
Wild-eddying swirl,
Or through the mining outlet bocked
Down-headlong hurl[4].
But nowhere does his delight in these features of his native landscape find more exuberant expression than in his 'Halloween,' when he interrupts his narrative of Leezie's misadventure to give a graphic picture of one of his brooks in the calm moonlight of an autumn evening.
Whyles owre a linn the bumie plays,
As thro' the glen it wimpl't;
Whyles round a rocky scaur it strays
Whyles in a wiel it dimpl't;
