half disposed to regret, however, amid all the
pleasure they afforded me, that the Addison of Scotland had not done for
the manners of his country what his illustrious prototype had done for
those of England, when my eye fell on the ninety-seventh number. I read
the introductory sentences, and admired their truth and elegance. I had
felt, in the contemplation of supereminent genius, the pleasure which
the writer describes, and my thoughts reverted to my two friends--the
dead and the living. "In the view of highly superior talents, as in
that of great and stupendous objects," says the essayist, "there is a
sublimity which fills the soul with wonder and delight--which expands
it, as it were, beyond its usual bounds, and which, investing our nature
with extraordinary powers and extraordinary honours, interests our
curiosity and flatters our pride."

I read on with increasing interest. It was evident, from the tone of the
introduction, that some new luminary had arisen in the literary horizon,
and I felt somewhat like a schoolboy when, at his first play, he waits
for the drawing up of the curtain. And the curtain at length rose. "The
person," continues the essayist, "to whom I allude"--and he alludes to
him as a genius of no ordinary class--"is Robert Burns, an Ayrshire
ploughman." The effect on my nerves seemed electrical; I clapped my
hands, and sprung from my seat: "Was I not certain of it! Did I not
foresee it!" I exclaimed. "My noble-minded friend, Robert Burns!" I ran
hastily over the warm-hearted and generous critique, so unlike the cold,
timid, equivocal notices with which the professional critic has greeted,
on their first appearance, so many works destined to immortality. It was
Mackenzie, the discriminating, the classical, the elegant, who assured
me that the productions of this "heaven-taught ploughman were fraught
with the high-toned feeling and the power and energy of expression
characteristic of the mind and voice of the poet"--with the solemn, the
tender, the sublime; that they contained images of pastoral beauty which
no other writer had ever surpassed, and strains of wild humour which
only the higher masters of the lyre had ever equalled; and that the
genius displayed in them seemed not less admirable in tracing the
manners than in painting the passions, or in drawing the scenery of
nature. I flung down the essay, ascended to the deck in three huge
strides, leaped ashore, and reached my bookseller's as he