, I must lay my account with an
exit truly _en poete_--if I die not of disease, I must perish with
hunger.

I have sent you one of the songs; the other my memory does not serve
me with, and I have no copy here; but I shall be at home soon, when I
will send it you.--Apropos to being at home, Mrs. Burns threatens, in
a week or two, to add one more to my paternal charge, which, if of the
right gender, I intend shall be introduced to the world by the
respectable designation of _Alexander Cunningham Burns._ My last was
_James Glencairn_, so you can have no objection to the company of
nobility. Farewell.

R. B.

* * * * *

CCCXXXVIII.

TO MR. GILBERT BURNS.

[This letter contained heavy news for Gilbert Burns: the loss of a
brother whom he dearly loved and admired, was not all, though the
worst.]

_10th July, 1796._

DEAR BROTHER,

It will be no very pleasing news to you to be told that I am
dangerously ill, and not likely to get better. An inveterate
rheumatism has reduced me to such a state of debility, and my appetite
is so totally gone, that I can scarcely stand on my legs. I have been
a week at sea-bathing, and I will continue there, or in a friend's
house in the country, all the summer. God keep my wife and children:
if I am taken from their head, they will be poor indeed. I have
contracted one or two serious debts, partly from my illness these many
months, partly from too much thoughtlessness as to expense, when I
came to town, that will cut in too much on the little I leave them in
your hands. Remember me to my mother.

Yours,

R. B.

* * * * *

CCCXXXIX.

TO MR. JAMES ARMOUR,

MASON, MAUCHLINE.

[The original letter is now in a safe sanctuary, the hands of the
poet's son, Major James Glencairn Burns.]

_July 10th_ [1796.]

For Heaven's sake, and as you value the we[l]fare of your daughter and
my wife, do, my dearest Sir, write to Fife, to Mrs. Armour to come if
possible. My wife thinks she can yet reckon upon a fortnight. The
medical people order me, _as I value my existence_, to fly to
sea-bathing and country-quarters, so it is ten thousand chances to one
that I shall not be within a dozen miles of her when her hour comes.
What a situation for her, poor girl, without a single friend by her on
such a serious moment.

I have now been a week at salt-water, and though I think I have got
some good by it, yet I hav