1. |
Edina! Scotia’s darling seat! |
All hail thy
palaces and tow’rs, |
Where once, beneath a Monarch’s feet, |
Sat Legislation’s
sov’reign pow’rs : |
From marking
wildly-scatt’red flow’rs, |
As on the banks of Ayr I stray’d, |
And singing, lone,
the ling’ring hours, |
I shelter in thy honor’d shade.
|
2. |
Here Wealth still swells the golden tide, |
As busy Trade his
labours plies ; |
There Architecture’s noble pride |
Bids elegance and
splendour rise : |
Here Justice, from
her native skies, |
High wields her balance and her rod ; |
There Learning,
with his eagle eyes, |
Seeks Science in her coy abode.
|
3. |
Thy sons, Edina, social, kind, |
With open arms the
stranger hail ; |
Their views enlarg’d, their lib’ral mind, |
Above the narrow,
rural vale ; |
Attentive still to
Sorrow’s wail, |
Or modest Merit’s silent claim : |
And never may
their sources fail! |
And never Envy blot their name!
|
4. |
Thy daughters bright thy walks adorn, |
Gay as the gilded
summer sky, |
Sweet as the dewy, milk-white thorn, |
Dear as the
raptur’d thrill of joy! |
Fair Burnet
strikes th’ adoring eye, |
Heav’n’s beauties on my fancy shine : |
I see the Sire of
Love on high, |
And own His work indeed divine!
|
5. |
There, watching high the least alarms, |
Thy rough, rude
fortress gleams afar ; |
Like some bold vet’ran, grey in arms, |
And mark’d with
many a seamy scar : |
The pond’rous wall
and massy bar, |
Grim-rising o’er the rugged rock, |
Have oft
withstood assailing war, |
And oft repell’d th’ invader’s shock.
|
6. |
With awe-stuck thought and pitying tears, |
I view that noble,
stately dome, |
Where Scotia’s kings of other years, |
Fam’d heroes! had
their royal home : |
Alas, how chang’d
the times to come! |
Their royal name low in the dust! |
Their haplesss
race wild-wand’ring roam! |
Tho’ rigid Law cries out: ‘’Twas just!’
|
7. |
Wild beats my heart to trace your steps, |
Whose ancestors,
in days of yore, |
Thro’hostile ranks and ruin’d gaps |
Old Scotia’s
bloody lion bore: |
Ev’n I, who sing
in rustic lore, |
Haply my sires have left their shed, |
And fac’d
grim Danger’s loudest roar, |
Bold-following where your fathers led!
|
8. |
Edine! Scotia’s darling seat! |
All hail thy
palaces and tow’rs ; |
Where once, beneath a Monarch’s feet, |
Sat Legislation’s
sov’reign pow’rs : |
From marking
wildly-scatt’red flow’rs, |
As on the banks of Ayr I stray’d, |
And singing,
lone, the ling’ring hours, |
I shelter in thy honour’d shade.
|
Robert Burns
| Classic Poems |
|
[ A Red, Red Rose ] [ To a Mountain Daisy ] [ Address to a Haggis ] [ Address to Edinburgh ] [ Auld Lang Syne ] [ Is there for Honest Poverty ] [ Address to the Unco Guid ] [ The Cotter's Saturday Night ] [ To a Louse ] [ My Heart's in the Highlands ] [ Holy Willie's Prayer ] [ Tam O'Shanter ] [ To a Mouse ] |