Читать книгу The Canongate Burns - Robert Burns - Страница 15

First printed in the Kilmarnock edition, 1786.

A robe of seeming truth and trust

Hid crafty observation;

And secret hung, with poison’d crust,

The dirk of defamation:

A mask that like the gorget show’d,

Dye-varying on the pigeon;

And for a mantle large and broad,

He wrapt him in Religion.

Tom Brown, Hypocrisy A-La-Mode.

Upon a simmer Sunday morn, summer

When Nature’s face is fair,

I walked forth to view the corn,

An’ snuff the callor air: fresh

5 The rising sun, owre GALSTON Muirs, over, moors

Wi’ glorious light was glintan;

The hares were hirplan down the furs, hobbling with uneven speed, furrows

The lav’rocks they were chantan larks

Fu’ sweet that day. full

10 As lightsomely I glowr’d abroad,

To see a scene sae gay, so

Three hizzies, early at the road, young wenches

Cam skelpan up the way. came hurrying

Twa had manteeles o’ dolefu’ black, two, mantles

15 But ane wi’ lyart lining; one, grey

The third, that gaed a wee aback, went, behind

Was in the fashion shining

Fu’ gay that day. full

The twa appear’d like sisters twin, two

20 In feature, form, an’ claes; clothes

Their visage — wither’d, lang an’ thin, long

An’ sour as onie slaes: any sloes

The third cam up, hap-step-an’-lowp, hop-step-and-leap

As light as onie lambie, — any lamb

25 An’ wi’ a curchie low did stoop, curtsey

As soon as e’er she saw me,

Fu’ kind that day.

Wi’ bonnet aff, quoth I, ‘Sweet lass, off

I think ye seem to ken me; know

30 I’m sure I’ve seen that bonie face, pretty

But yet I canna name ye. — ’ cannot

Quo’ she, an’ laughin as she spak, spoke

An’ taks me by the hands,

‘Ye, for my sake, hae gi’en the feck have given, bulk

35 Of a’ the ten commands

A screed some day. rip

‘My name is FUN — your cronie dear, friend

The nearest friend ye hae; have

An’ this is SUPERSTITION here,

40 An’ that’s HYPOCRISY.

I’m gaun to Mauchline Holy Fair, going

To spend an hour in daffin: larking/playing

Gin ye’ll go there, yon runkl’d pair, if, wrinkled

We will get famous laughin

45 At them this day.’

Quoth I, ‘Wi’ a’ my heart, I’ll do’t;

I’ll get my Sunday’s sark on, shirt

An’ meet you on the holy spot;

Faith, we’se hae fine remarkin!’ we’ll have

50 Then I gaed hame at crowdie-time, went, breakfast/gruel

An’ soon I made me ready;

For roads were clad, frae side to side, filled

Wi’ monie a wearie body, many

In droves that day.

55 Here farmers gash, in ridin graith, smart, gear

Gaed hoddan by their cotters; went jogging, farm workers

There swankies young, in braw braid-claith, strapping fellows, fine broadcloth

Are springan owre the gutters. jumping over

The lasses, skelpan barefit, thrang, hastening barefoot, crowded

60 In silks an’ scarlets glitter;

Wi’ sweet-milk cheese, in monie a whang, many, large slice

An’ farls, bak’d wi’ butter, cakes

Fu’ crump that day. hard or crisp

When by the plate we set our nose, collection plate

65 Weel heapè d up wi’ ha’pence,

A greedy glowr Black-bonnet throws, stare, Church elder

An’ we maun draw our tippence. must give

Then in we go to see the show:

On ev’ry side they’re gath’ran;

70 Some carryin dails, some chairs an’ stools, bench planks

An’ some are busy bleth’ran talking gossip

Right loud that day.

Here, stands a shed to fend the show’rs, ward off

An’ screen our countra Gentry; country

75 There Racer Jess, an’ twa-three whores, two or three

Are blinkan at the entry.

Here sits a raw o’ tittlan jads, giggling girls

Wi’ heavin breasts an’ bare neck;

An’ there a batch o’ Wabster lads, group of weavers

80 Blackguardin frae Kilmarnock, mischief making from

For fun this day.

Here some are thinkan on their sins,

An’ some upo’ their claes; clothes

Ane curses feet that fyl’d his shins, one, soiled, shoes/feet

85 Anither sighs an’ prays: another

On this hand sits a Chosen swatch, sample

Wi’ screw’d-up, grace-proud faces;

On that, a set o’ chaps, at watch,

Thrang winkan on the lasses busy

90 To chairs that day.

O happy is that man an’ blest!

Nae wonder that it pride him! no

Whase ain dear lass, that he likes best, whose own

Comes clinkan down beside him! sitting quickly

95 Wi’ arm repos’d on the chair back,

He sweetly does compose him;

Which, by degrees, slips round her neck,

An’s loof upon her bosom, hand

Unkend that day. unnoticed

100 Now a’ the congregation o’er

Is silent expectation;

For Moodie speels the holy door, reaches

Wi’ tidings o’ damnation:

Should Hornie, as in ancient days, the Devil

105 ’Mang sons o’ God present him;

The vera sight o’ Moodie’s face, very

To’s ain het hame had sent him to his own hot home

Wi’ fright that day.

Hear how he clears the points o’ Faith

110 Wi’ rattlin and thumpin!

Now meekly calm, now wild in wrath,

He’s stampan, an’ he’s jumpan! stomping

His lengthen’d chin, his turn’d-up snout,

His eldritch squeel an’ gestures, unearthly squeal

115 O how they fire the heart devout,

Like cantharidian plaisters blister-producing plasters

On sic a day! such

But hark! the tent has chang’d its voice;

There’s peace an’ rest nae langer; no longer

120 For a’ the real judges rise,

They canna sit for anger: cannot

Smith opens out his cauld harangues, cold

On practice and on morals;

An’ aff the godly pour in thrangs, off, groups

125 To gie the jars an’ barrels give

A lift that day. to drink

What signifies his barren shine,

Of moral pow’rs an’ reason;

His English style, an’ gesture fine

130 Are a’ clean out o’ season.

Like SOCRATES or ANTONINE,

Or some auld pagan heathen, old

The moral man he does define,

But ne’er a word o’ faith in

135 That’s right that day.

In guid time comes an antidote good

Against sic poison’d nostrum; such, preaching

For Peebles, frae the water-fit, from, mouth of the river

Ascends the holy rostrum:

140 See, up he’s got the Word o’ God,

An’ meek an’ mim has view’d it,

While COMMON-SENSE has taen the road,

An’ aff, an’ up the Cowgate1

Fast, fast that day.

145 Wee Miller niest, the Guard relieves, next

An’ Orthodoxy raibles, recites by rote

Tho’ in his heart he weel believes, well

An’ thinks it auld wives’ fables: old

But faith! the birkie wants a Manse: fellow

150 So, cannilie he hums them; carefully he humbugs

Altho’ his carnal Wit an’ Sense

Like hafflins-wise o’ercomes him almost half-wise

At times that day.

Now butt an’ ben the Change-house fills, every corner of the Ale House

155 Wi’ yill-caup Commentators: ale cup

Here’s crying out for bakes an’ gills, biscuits

An’ there the pint-stowp clatters; pint-jug slams

While thick an’ thrang, an’ loud an’ lang, crowded, long

Wi’ Logic an’ wi’ Scripture,

160 They raise a din, that, in the end noise

Is like to breed a rupture

O’ wrath that day.

Leeze me on Drink! it gies us mair my blessings, gives, more

Than either School or Colledge;

165 It kindles Wit, it waukens Lear, wakens learning

It pangs us fou o’ Knowledge: crams, full

Be’t whisky-gill or penny wheep, small beer costing a penny

Or onie stronger potion, any

It never fails, on drinkin deep,

170 To kittle up our notion, enliven spirits

By night or day.

The lads an’ lasses, blythely bent

To mind baith saul an’ body, both soul

Sit round the table, weel content, well

175 An’ steer about the Toddy: stir

On this ane’s dress, an’ that ane’s leuk, one’s, look

They’re makin observations;

While some are cozie i’ the neuk, cosy, corner

An’ formin assignations

180 To meet some day.

But now the Lord’s ain trumpet touts, own, sounds

Till a’ the hills are rairan, roaring back the echo

And echoes back return the shouts;

Black Russell is na spairan: not sparing

185 His piercin words, like Highlan’ swords,

Divide the joints an’ marrow;

His talk o’ Hell, whare devils dwell, where

Our vera ‘Sauls does harrow’2 very souls

Wi’ fright that day.

190 A vast, unbottom’d, boundless Pit,

Fill’d fou o’ lowan brunstane, full, flaming brimstone

Whase ragin flame, an’ scorchin heat, whose

Wad melt the hardest whun-stane! would, whinstone

The half-asleep start up wi’ fear,

195 An’ think they hear it roaran; roaring

When presently it does appear,

’Twas but some neebor snoran neighbour, snoring

Asleep that day.

’Twad be owre lang a tale to tell, over long

200 How monie stories past; many

An’ how they crouded to the yill, crowded, ale

When they were a’ dismist;

How drink gaed round, in cogs an’ caups, went, wooden jugs, cups

Amang the furms an’ benches; among, a row of seats

205 An’ cheese an’ bread, frae women’s laps, from

Was dealt about in lunches,

An’ dawds that day. large pieces

In comes a gausie, gash Guidwife, jolly, smart, good-

An’ sits down by the fire,

210 Syne draws her kebbuck an’ her knife; then, cheese

The lasses they are shyer:

The auld Guidmen, about the grace, old, good-

Frae side to side they bother; from

Till some ane by his bonnet lays, one, cap

215 An’ gies them’t, like a tether, gives, rope

Fu’ lang that day. long

Waesucks! for him that gets nae lass, Alas!, no

Or lasses that hae naething! have nothing

Sma’ need has he to say a grace,

220 Or melvie his braw claithing! dirty with meal, fine clothes

O Wives, be mindfu’, ance yoursel, once

How bonie lads ye wanted; handsome

An’ dinna for a kebbuck-heel do not, hard cheeese rind

Let lasses be affronted

225 On sic a day! such

Now Clinkumbell,3 wi’ rattlan tow, noisy pull

Begins to jow an’ croon; swing, toll

Some swagger hame the best they dow, home, can

Some wait the afternoon.

230 At slaps the billies halt a blink, a dyke gap, young lads

Till lasses strip their shoon: take off, shoes

Wi’ faith an’ hope, an’ love an’ drink,

They’re a’ in famous tune

For crack that day. talk

235 How monie hearts this day converts many

O’ Sinners and o’ Lasses!

Their hearts o’ stane, gin night, are gane stone, come, gone

As saft as onie flesh is: soft, any

There’s some are fou o’ love divine; full

240 There’s some are fou o’ brandy; full

An’ monie jobs that day begin, many

May end in Houghmagandie sexual intercourse

Some ither day. other

This celebration of the sensual capacity of the Scottish people to resist the worst rhetorical excesses of their clerical masters was written in 1785 and revised in early 1786 for the Kilmarnock edition. As McGuirk notes it is a direct descendent of Fergusson’s Leith Races which itself descends from Milton’s L’Allegro and the nine-line Scottish medieval ‘brawl’ poem:

I dwall amang the caller springs

That weet the Land o’ Cakes,

And aften tune my canty strings

At bridals and late-wakes.

They ca’ me Mirth; I ne’er was kend

To grumble or look sour,

But blyth was be to lift a lend,

Gif ye was sey my pow’r

An’ pith this day.

Fergusson’s poem is, of course, the celebration of a purely secular occasion; Burns is writing a more complex religious satire. Crawford (Burns, A Study of the Poems and Songs, p. 69) places the occasional poem accurately in the long Covenanter-originated Scottish tradition of open-air preaching. This specific event held in Mauchline in 1785 gathered together an audience of 2000 (four times the Mauchline population) of whom 1200 were communicants. Gilbert recorded that his brother was witness to this and had personal knowledge of the preachers he so incisively satirises.

Burns takes his epigraph from Hypocrisy A-La-Mode, a play written in 1704 by Tom Brown. That gale of liberal, satirical, enlightened laughter that runs through eighteenth-century English literature, especially Henry Fielding, as it attempts to sweep away institutionalised religious hypocrisy also blows powerfully through Burns’s writings. He is the major Scottish variant on this anti-clerical Enlightenment project. His Scotland, however, was a darker, more theocratically-controlled state than almost anywhere else in Europe. In his early writing, as here, he senses victory over the savage forces of religious repression. Later, his mood was to darken as he despaired of the unbreakable grip Calvin’s damnation had on the Scottish psyche and, hence, body politic.

This early poem has, however, the comic optimism of Fielding’s Tom Jones rather than the demonic repression of Blake’s The Songs of Experience. The roaring flames of hell here (ll. 190–8) are merely the snores of a fellow pew-member. Unlike Macbeth, who tragically meets three witches on the moor, our comic narrator meets only two, Superstition and Hypocrisy, but their gorgeous sister Fun is an immediately victorious Cinderella and her spirit drives the whole poem. If not promiscuous, Fun is a decidedly erotic young lady as are the young women running barefoot, to save their shoes, towards the thronging excitement and carrying gifts which might be for the satisfaction of appetites other than those of the stomach. Indeed, the whole poem is infused with the way in which the people convert the ‘Occasion’, so clerically defined, into an opportunity for their multiple, but especially sexual, appetites:

O happy is that man an’ blest!

Nae wonder that it pride him!

Whase ain dear lass, that he likes best,

Comes clinkan down beside him!

This echo of Psalm 46 also alerts us to the fact that the rhetorical world of these preachers breeds sexual ills. For example, in 1.116, ‘cantharidian plaisters’ were poultices made from the aphrodisiac Spanish fly.

Burns’s assault on the various masters of pulpit oratory names names in a way that ensured there would be a severe backlash against him. ‘Sawney’ Moodie, with his old-time, ‘Auld-Licht’ undiluted gospel of damnation, is first on stage (ll. 100–17). Moodie (1728–99) was minister of Riccarton near Kilmarnock. He is followed by the ‘New Licht’ George Smith (d. 1823), minister of Galston. McGuirk subtly argues that while Burns is criticising Smith’s rhetorical banality, he is more intent on satirising the congregation whose appetite for hell-fire preaching excludes the life of actual good-works. Smith’s position is then assaulted by William Peebles of Newton-upon-Ayr (1753–1826) who, further inflaming the malign passions of the congregation, drives Common Sense, a central value of the new, more liberal Christianity, from the field. He is succeeded by Alexander Miller (d. 1804) whose professional self-seeking rebounded against him when the parishioners of Kilmaurs subsequently attempted to stop him getting that charge due, he claimed, to the effects of ll. 145–54. The worst is saved to the last. ‘Black’ John Russel (c. 1740–1817) was then minister at Kilmarnock. Subsequently minister at Cromarty, Hugh Miller (My Schools and Schoolmasters) testified to his capacity to terrify, indeed, traumatise his congregation.

Along with such manifestations of theocratic control Burns adds some more overt political commentary. ‘Racer Jess’ is Janet Gibson (d. 1813), who is the daughter of Poosie Nansie, mine hostess of Love and Liberty, is with her like-inclined companions strategically placed beside the laird’s tent. In the same stanza, the ‘Wabster lads/ Blackguarding from Kilmarnock’ probably belong to the weaving community which was deeply and dissidently radical.

The poem moves from a celebration of alcohol (ll. 163–71) and the triumph of this earthy spirit over the one of false sanctimony to a triumphant assertion, implicit throughout the poem, of spontaneous eroticism. The experienced women may already be dealing out more than bread and cheese but, assignations made, loss of virginity happily looms at the poem’s end. As Edwin Muir wrote, regarding the ‘sordid and general tyranny’ of the kirk session: ‘it is only necessary to say that the time-honoured Scottish tradition of fornication triumphantly survived all its terrors’ (John Knox, 1930, pp. 306–7).

1 A street so called, which faces the tent in Mauchline. R.B.

2 Shakespeare’s Hamlet, R.B. [Act I, Sc. 5].

3 The Bell Ringer.