Page:Beauties of Burn's poems.pdf/6

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The mother, mi' a woman's wiles, can spy
 What maks the youth sae bashfu' and sae grave:
Weel pleas'd to think her bairn's respeckitlike the lave

O happy love! where love like this is found:
 O heart-felt raptures! bliss beyond compare!
I've paced much this weary mortal round,
 And sure Experience bids me this declare-
If Heav'n a draught of heavenly pleasure spare,
 One cordial in this melancholy vale,
'Tis when a youthful, loving, modest pair,
 In others arms, breathe out the tender tale,
Beneath the milli-white tharn that scents the
    evening gale.

Is there in human form, that bears the heart-
 A wretch! a villain! lost to love and truth!
That ean, with studied, sly, ensnaring art,
 Betray sweet Jenny's unsuspecting youth?
Curse on his perjur'd arts! dissembling smooth!
 Are Honour, Virtue, Conscience, all exil'd?
Is there no Pity, no relenting Ruth.
 Points to the Parents fondling o'er their child?
Then paints the ruin'd maid, and their ditraction wile

Put now the supper crowns the simple board,
 The healsome Parritch, chief of Scotia's food,
The some their only Hawkie does afford,
 That yont the hallan snugly chows her cood:
The Dame brings forth, in complimental mood,
 To grace the Lad, her well-lain't kebheck fell,
And aft he's prest, and aft he ca's it gude;
 The frugal Wifie, garrulous, will tell
How 'twas a towmond auld sin lint was i' the bell.