Ev’n winter bleak has charms to me When winds rave thro’ the naked tree; Or frosts on hills of Ochiltree Are hoary gray; Or blinding drifts wild-furious flee Dark’ning the day! O Nature! a’ thy shews and forms To feeling, pensive hearts hae charms, Whether the summer kindly warms Wi’ life an’ light; Or winter howls, in gusty storms, The lang, dark night. [503] Burns, “Works,” IV, 272. [504] “The Vision,” sts. 36, 37. [505] Burns, “Works,” I, 18. In one poem Burns declares that he prefers “wild mossy moors” to “Forth’s sunny shores,” but a characteristic reason, For there by a lanely sequestered stream Resides a sweet lassie, my thought and my dream, forbids the use of the passage as a proof of real enjoyment of the wild in Nature. [506] Burns, “Works,” VI, 242. [507] _Ibid._, p. 241. [508] _Ibid._, V, 165. [509] Burns warmly admired Ossian, and this phrase sounds like an echo from one of the Ossian poems. [510] Burns, “A Winter Night.” [511] _Ibid._, “The Brigs of Ayr.” [512] _Ibid._, “Works,” V, 231. [513] Burns, “Elegy on Captain Henderson.” [514] Bowles, “Poetical Works,” II, XII (ed. 1855). [515] See sonnet by Coleridge. [516] “After this third edition came out, my friend Mr. Crutwell, the printer, wrote a letter saying that two young gentlemen, strangers, one a particularly handsome and pleasing youth, lately from Westminster School, [Robert Southey] and both literary and intelligent, spoke in high commendation of my volume.”--Bowles, “Poems” (Introduction to ed. of 1837). [517] “Fourteen Sonnets,” 1789. The same with additions, 1790. The same reproduced with illustrations, 1798. [518] Bowles, “Poems,” Introduction to edition of 1837. [519] “Hope.” [520] “The Tweed Visited.” [521] “Elegy Written at the Hotwells, Bristol.” [522] “To the River Itchen.” [523] “The River Cherwell.” [524] “Elegy Written at the Hotwells, Bristol.” [525] “The River Wainsbeck.” [526] _Ibid._ [527] “At Tynemouth Priory.” [528] “Absence.” [529] “The Bells, Ostend.” [530] “At Malvern.” [531] Bowles, “Memoir.” [532] I have been unable to find the exact date of this letter, but in all probability it antedates “The Life of John Buncle” and the “Descriptive Poem” by some years. It was probably before 1760, because at that time occurred the quarrel between Lyttleton and Brown. It seems also probable that it was before 1756, because at that time Dr. Brown took the living at Great Horkesley, near Colchester. The most natural period for the Letter is between 1748 and 1754, for at some time during that period, and apparently during the early part of it, Dr. Brown held the living of Morland, Westmoreland. (See “Brown,” “Osbaldiston,” “Lyttleton” in “Nat. Dict. of Biog.” and memoir of Brown in “British Poets.”) [533] Young explains that he cannot find anyone to spell the names for him so he must spell them as they are pronounced.