with critical observations and biographical notices, by Robert Burns

15
THE FLOWERS OF EDINBURGH.
This song is one of the many effusions of Scots
jacobitism.— The title j Flowers of Edinburgh, has
no tnanner of connexion with the present verses, so
I suspect there has been an older set of words, of
zvhich the title is all that remains.
Bi/ the bye, it is singidar enough that the Scot-
tish Muses were all Jacobites.—I have paid more
attention to every description of Scots songs than
perhaps any body living has done, and I do not re-
collect one single stanza, or even the title of the
most trifling Scots air, zi)hich has the least panegy-
rical reference to the families of Nassau or Brunszmck;
while there are hundreds satirizing them.—
This may be thought no panegyric on the Scots
Poets, but I mean it as such. For myself, I would
always take it as a compliment to have it said, that
my heart ran before my head;^—and surely the
* Poor Burns!—Thy heart indeed ran always before thy
head ; but never didst thou fail to carry thy reader's heart along
with thee.—Instead of kindling at the indignities offered to thy
native land, hadst thou been a wise and a prudent poet, thou
would'st have tuned thy lyre to the praise of some powerful
family, and carefully abstained from drawing on thy head the
resentment