We have thus one tale, _Tam o’ Shanter_, which was included in the third edition of the poems, that of 1793; one longish descriptive piece, _The Cotter’s Saturday Night_; more than two hundred songs, ranging in quality from very good to middling; and a great number of short epistles, epigrams, elegies, and other types of miscellaneous verse. =3. Features of his Poetry.= The poetry is of such a miscellaneous character, and its composition was often so haphazard in the matter of time, that it is almost impossible to give a detailed chronology of it. We shall therefore take it in the mass, and attempt the difficult task of giving an analysis of its various features. (_a_) The best work of Burns was almost entirely _lyrical_ in motive. He is one of the rare examples, like Shelley, of the born singer who can give to human emotion a precious and imperishable utterance. He was essentially the inspired egoist: what interested him was vivid and quickening; what lay outside his knowledge and experience was without life or flavor. He thought of reviving the Scottish drama, but, even if he had entered on the project, it is doubtful if he would have succeeded, for he lacked the faculty of putting himself completely in another man’s place. His narrative gift, as it is revealed in _Tam o’ Shanter_, becomes fused with the heat of some lyrical emotion (in this case that of drunken jollity), and then it shines with a clear flame. But with the departure of the lyrical emotion the narrative impulse ends as well. (_b_) While keeping within the limits of the lyric he traverses an _immense range_ of emotion and experience. The feelings he describes are those of the Scottish peasant, but the genius of the poet makes them germane to every member of the human race; he discovers the touch of nature that makes the whole world kin. Here we have the “passion and apathy, and glory and shame” that are the inspiration of the lyrical poet, and we have them in rich abundance. (_c_) His _humor and pathos_ are as copious and varied as his subject-matter. His wit can be rollicking to coarseness, as it is in _The Jolly Beggars_; and there are no poems richer in bacchanalian flavor than _Willie brewed a Peck o’ Maut_ and _Tam o’ Shanter_. He can run to the other extreme of emotion, and be graceful and sentimental, as in _Afton Water_ and _My Luve is like a Red, Red Rose_. We have beautiful homely songs in _John Anderson, my Jo_ and _O’ a’ the Airts_; and he can be bitter and scornful in such poems as _The Unco Guid_ and _The Holy Fair_. His pathos ranges from the piercing cry of _Ae Fond Kiss_, through the pensive pessimism of _Ye Banks and Braes_, to the tempered melancholy of _My Heart’s in the Hielands_. The facility of this precious lyrical gift became a positive weakness, for he wrote too freely, and much of his songwriting is of mediocre quality.