Читать книгу The Complete Works - Роберт Бернс, Robert Burns - Страница 122
THE POETICAL WORKS OF ROBERT BURNS
CXX. TO JOHN TAYLOR
Оглавление[Burns, it appears, was, in one of his excursions in revenue matters, likely to be detained at Wanlockhead: the roads were slippery with ice, his mare kept her feet with difficulty, and all the blacksmiths of the village were pre-engaged. To Mr. Taylor, a person of influence in the place, the poet, in despair, addressed this little Poem, begging his interference: Taylor spoke to a smith; the smith flew to his tools, sharpened or frosted the shoes, and it is said lived for thirty years to boast that he had “never been well paid but ance, and that was by a poet, who paid him in money, paid him in drink, and paid him in verse.”]
With Pegasus upon a day,
Apollo weary flying,
Through frosty hills the journey lay,
On foot the way was plying,
Poor slip-shod giddy Pegasus
Was but a sorry walker;
To Vulcan then Apollo goes,
To get a frosty calker.
Obliging Vulcan fell to work,
Threw by his coat and bonnet,
And did Sol’s business in a crack;
Sol paid him with a sonnet.
Ye Vulcan’s sons of Wanlockhead,
Pity my sad disaster;
My Pegasus is poorly shod—
I’ll pay you like my master.
Robert Burns.
Ramages, 3 o’clock, (no date.)
