stay at Brow, on the 12th of July, he wrote to Thomson the following
memorable letter:--

"After all my boasted independence, curst necessity compels me to
implore you for five pounds. A cruel scoundrel of a haberdasher, to
whom I owe an account, taking it into his head that I am dying, has
commenced a process, and will infallibly put me into jail. Do, for
God's sake, send that sum, and that by return of post. Forgive me this
earnestness, but the horrors of a jail have made me half distracted. I
do not ask all this gratuitously; for, upon returning health, I hereby
promise and engage to furnish you with five pounds' worth of the
neatest song-genius you have seen. I tried my hand on Rothemurchie
this morning. The measure is so difficult that it is impossible to
infuse much genius into the lines. They are on the other side.
Forgive, forgive me!"

And on the other side was written Burns's last song beginning, (p. 183)
"Fairest maid, on Devon banks." Was it native feeling, or inveterate
habit, that made him that morning revert to the happier days he had
seen on the banks of Devon, and sing a last song to one of the two
beauties he had there admired? Chambers thinks it was to Charlotte
Hamilton, the latest editor refers it to Peggy Chalmers.

Thomson at once sent the sum asked for. He has been much, but not
justly, blamed for not having sent a much larger sum, and indeed for
not having repaid the poet for his songs long before. Against such
charges it is enough to reply that when Thomson had formerly
volunteered some money to Burns in return for his songs, the indignant
poet told him that if he ever again thought of such a thing, their
intercourse must thenceforth cease. And for the smallness of the sum
sent, it should be remembered that Thomson was himself a poor man, and
had not at this time made anything by his Collection of Songs, and
never did make much beyond repayment of his large outlay.

On the same day on which Burns wrote thus to Thomson, he wrote another
letter in much the same terms to his cousin, Mr. James Burnes, of
Montrose, asking him to assist him with ten pounds, which was at once
sent by his relative, who, though not a rich, was a generous-hearted
man.

There was still a third letter written on that 12th of July (1796)
from Brow. Of Mrs. Dunlop, who had for some months ceased her
correspondence with him, the poet takes this affecting farewell:--"I
have written you so often, without receiving a