Page:Beauties of Burn's poems.pdf/70

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Hail, Majesty most excellent!
 While nobles strive to please ye,
Will ye accept a compliment
 A simple Bardie gies ye?
Thae bonny bairn-time Heav'n has lent,
 Still higher may they heeze ye
In bliss, till Fate some day is sent
 For ever to release ye
Frae care that day.

For you, young Potentate of ———,
 I tell Your Higliness fairly,
Down Pleasure's stream, wi' swelling sails,
 I'm tauld, ye're driving rarely!
But some day ye may gnaw your nails,
 And curse your folly sairly,
That e'er ye brak Diana's pales,
 Or rattl'd dice wi' Charlie
By night or day.

Yet aft a ragged Cowte's been known
 To make a noble Aiver;
Sae ye may doucely fill a throne,
 For a' their clishmaclaver:
There him^[1] at Agincourt wha shone,
 Few better were, or braver,
And yet wi' funny, queer Sir John^[2],
 He was an unco shaver
For monie a day.

1. King Henry V.
2. Sir John Falstaff—See Shakespeare.