Robert Burns (1759–1796). Poems and Songs.
The Harvard Classics. 1909–14. |
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| 251. Impromptu Lines to Captain Riddell |
| | | | | On Returning a Newspaper. |
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| YOUR News and Review, sir. | |
| I’ve read through and through, sir, | |
| With little admiring or blaming; | |
| The Papers are barren | |
| Of home-news or foreign, | 5 |
| No murders or rapes worth the naming. | |
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| Our friends, the Reviewers, | |
| Those chippers and hewers, | |
| Are judges of mortar and stone, sir; | |
| But of meet or unmeet, | 10 |
| In a fabric complete, | |
| I’ll boldly pronounce they are none, sir; | |
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| My goose-quill too rude is | |
| To tell all your goodness | |
| Bestow’d on your servant, the Poet; | 15 |
| Would to God I had one | |
| Like a beam of the sun, | |
| And then all the world, sir, should know it! | |
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