Robert BurnsLimited World Federation Limited www.rbwf.org.uk 1969 The digital conversion of this Burns Chronicle was sponsored by Thomas Perez and Helen McCallum Perez for all past, present and future Detroit Burns Club members The digital conversion service was provided by DDSR Document Scanning by permission of the Robert Burns World Federation Limited to whom all Copyright title belongs. www.DDSR.com ROBERT BURNS CHRONICLE 1969 THE BURNS FEDERATION KILMARNOCK Price 7s. 6d.-Paper bound: 12s. 6d.-Cloth bound: Price to Non-Members lOs.-Paper bound: lSs.-Cloth bound, 'BURNS CHRONICLE' ADVERTISER J Scotch as it used to be I I I BURNS CHRONICLE BURNS CHRONICLE AND CLUB DIRECTORY INSTITUTED 1891 PUBLISHED ANNUALLY THIRD SERIES: VOLUME XVIII THE BURNS FEDERATION KILMARNOCK 1969 PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN BY WILUAU HODGE AND CO., LTD., GLASGOW LIST OF CONTENTS PAGE A Work For All Time. The Poems and Songs of Robert Bums. Edited by James Kinsley. Reviewed by Alex. MacMillan The Best Biography of Burns. The Life of Robert Burns. By Franklyn Bliss Snyder. Reviewed by the Editor 5 Is This Really Burns? By George A. Young 8 Auguste Angellier. Translations from his Work on Burns by Jane Burgoyne 11 Burns and Immigration 29 The Letters of Jean Armour (11) by Alex. MacMillan 30 The Bums Pilgrimage. By John Gray 34 The Quiet Gentleman. New Poem by Alice V. Stuart 38 Rosebery Burns Club's Oldest Member 39 A Burns Night Spectacular .. 40 The Bums Club of London, 1868-1968 41 Obituaries 44 Book Reviews 46 Burns House Museum, Mauchline .. 54 Junior Burns Chronicle 55 The Bums Federation- (a) List of Hon. Presidents, Hon. Vice-Presidents, Executive Committee, Office-bearers and District Representatives, Sub-committees, Auditors and Associate Members . 65 ,I . I / )I (b) List of Past Presidents 70 List of Places at which the Annual Conferences of the Council have been held 71 (c) Constitution and Rules 72 (d) List of Districts 77 (e) Minutes of the Annual Conference, 1968, incor- porating the Hon. Secretary's Report, Financial Statement, Burns Chronicle and Schools Competi- tions reports 86 (f) Club Reports 104 (g) Numerical List of Clubs on the Roll 137 (h) Alphabetical List of Clubs on the Roll 166 i ! !t t ' I I I I I ILLUSTRATIONS Robert Donaldson, President, Bums Federation frontispiece James Kinsley, Professor of English Studies University of Nottingham facing page 1 Portrait, believed to be a contemporary one of Bums, now in Lady Stair's House Museum, Edinburgh facing page 8 The Jean Armour Letters facing page 32 Ii EDITORIAL NOTE The Bums Federation does not accept responsibility for statements made or opinions expressed in the Burns Chronicle. Writers are responsible for articles signed by them: the Editor undertakes responsibility for the Junior Burns Chronicle and all unsigned matter. Manuscripts for publication should be addressed to the Editor and each must be accompanied by a stamped addressed envelope. The Editor cannot accept responsibility for loss or damage. JAMES VEITCH. NEWBIGGING, TWEEDSMUIR, BIGGAR, LANARKSHIRE. ROBERT DONALDSON President Burns Federation JAMES KINSLEY Professor of English Studies University of Nottingham A WORK FOR ALL TIME THE POEMS AND SONGS OF ROBERT BURNS, Edited by James Kinsley. In three volumes (Volume I, II Text, Volume III, Commentary). Oxford University Press, £9 10s. Reviewed by ALEX. MACMILLAN This monumental work, the definitive edition of the Poet's songs and poems, has been a long time a-making. Professor Kinsley has worked on it for twelve years. Before that, as he gladly acknowledges in his Preface, a great deal of preliminary work had been done by the late Professor Dewar, of Reading University. In paying tribute to him, Professor Kinsley mentions 'his engrossing talk about a poet whom he understood as much by instinct and spiritual kinship as by study'. Dewar was born in Dundonald in Ayrshire, the son of a head gardener, and had his schooling at Irvine Royal Academy. Kinsley tells us. that his concern was to provide a complete list of Burns's original poems, and of songs and ballads which he recovered and re-shaped from oral tradition. In addition to this, he gives us the airs of the songs in their eighteenth century form. He bases his texts on a critical examination of 800 manuscripts, includes songs collected by Bums, and those about which there is some doubt in authorship. Not only does he list the sources of the poems, and where they are now to be found, but he provides a lively commentary on every poem and song. He relates many to their association with Scottish tradition, and demonstrates how their roots were often in folk-lore, no matter what was the occasion which set the Poet's 'barmy noddle working prime'. This is not merely the whole of the Burns legend, this is it explained and related to Scots thinking, to Scots manners, and to Scottish history. Added to all this, Professor Kinsley has added to the Commentary volume an appendix giving the contemporary impressions of Bums from such diverse personalities as Dugald Stewart and Maria Riddell, among others. This will provide the back-ground to many a future Immortal Memory. Inevitably there are surprises. In the first section, which the Editor states includes poems and songs written 1774-1784, number 8 is 'Corn Rigs'. Ayrshire tradition has it that the girl of this poem was Annie Rankine, whom Bums did not meet till his Mossgiel days. 2 A WORK FOR ALL TIME But apart from this, one must marvel at the ease of lyric-writing already shown by the poet. It will be remembered that Professor DeLancy Ferguson believed that Bums's lyrical gift was the fore­ most one, and David Daiches, too, spends considerable time dis­ cussing the poetic merits of 'Corn Rigs', obviously written to be sung, not recited. No. 30 is 'Mary Morrison', another song written before Bums had become a poet by habit. We have the Poet's word for it that it was 'one of my juvenile works,' but a critic like Crawford has a huge opinion of it, and Kinsley has the discerning note 'it is a notable early attempt to marry words to music'. I Bums declared that 'the first of my poetic offspring that saw the light' was 'The Holy Tulzie'-the story of the quarrel between the I Rev. Mr. Moodie of Riccarton and Russel of Kilmarnock, who were later to be immortalised in 'The Holy Fair'. A perfect example of the erudition the Kinsley brings to bear on a poem is seen in his remarks on 'The Holy Fair'. First nailing the poem to the date 1785, he proves that it was revised in 1786 for publication. He quotes from Gilbert Bums-'most of the incidents he mentions had actually passed before his eyes,' goes on to mention references to such celebrations in rural parishes, and then leaves the social for the poetic back-ground. Quoting Lockhart's phrase that with the publication of 'The Holy Fair'-'national manners were once more in the hands of a national poet,' he goes on to give many instances in literature of the peasant brawl. Kinsley then has 'this to say, ' "The Holy Fair" lifts the brawl to a new level of com­ plexity, satiric art and social significance'. It is good to find a scholar placing this magnificent but underrated poem in the high category to which it belongs. The text of Book II begins at the Ellisland period, when the Poet was turned song-writer, but of course in the autumn of 1790, turned aside from this to write the immortal 'Tam O' Shanter' for Captain Grose. It was in November of that year when Bums sent part of 'Tam O' Shanter' to Mrs. Dunlop at Loudon Castle. When she asked for and received the whole poem, as Kinsley says, 'her response was priggish'. Bums defended himself, saying that the poem 'had a finishing polish I despair of ever excelling' as well as a 'spice of roguish waggery that might perhaps be as well spared'. Mrs. Dunlop criticises-'the sweat and smoke of one line which I felt rather a little too strong for me'. Kinsley's criticism of the lady is apt. The Editor quotes various interpretations of the poem, and gives a splendidly forthright interpretation of his own. This is A WORK FOR ALL TIME 3 criticism at its best, and must be read by all who love the poem. Professor Kinsley makes very clear the distinction between James Johnson and George Thomson as collectors and editors of Scots song. Johnson became the Principal Music-engraver in ScotlandinBums'sday. 'Thefirst volume of his "Musical Museum" proved to be the climax of a century of Scottish song collection.' 'Bums's meetings with Johnson ... deepened and enriched his growing sense of vocation as a national poet.' Almost everything the Poet wrote between the summer of 1787 and late 1792-more than 200 songs-went to Johnson for the 'Museum'. Thomson, on the other hand was a carping dilettante compared with Johnson. Professor Kinsley quotes his letter to Bums, inviting the author of the 'Cottar's Saturday Night' to take up the pen for him. He had got 'the most agreeable composer living' (Pleyel) to agree to orchestrate what were folk-songs! No wonder Bums replied, 'My Dear Sir, you are too fastidious in your ideas of songs and ballads'. But songs began to pass between them, although Bums always preferred the honest work of Johnson. When we come to Volume III, it is borne in on us just why there exists the great love for our poetic genius wherever there are Scots.