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Canceled Passages in the Letters of Robert Burns to George Thomson
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 23 February 2021
Extract
If any part of Robert Burns' extensive correspondence would seem to have been thoroughly edited, it is the series of letters he wrote to George Thomson in the course of his contributions to that worthy's Select Collection of Original Scotish Airs. Unlike the rest of the correspondence, this series was never dispersed. Though one letter somehow found its way into the Pickering Collection, and so into the British Museum, the remaining fifty-five continued in Thomson's possession until his death in 1851. In the following year they were bought by Lord Dalhousie, in whose collection they remained until they were acquired by Mr. J. P. Morgan. Thomson had placed the letters in the hands of Dr. Currie, the poet's first biographer, who selected mangled fragments for publication, and during their half-century at Brechin Castle they were freely accessible to Burns scholars, among them Scott Douglas and William Wallace. The former of these declared in his 1877 edition of the Complete Works that the letters to Thomson “are here for the first time printed exactly as they appear in the original manuscripts” —a claim which with true editorial amenity is balanced by Wallace's statement that “an examination of the letters written by Burns to George Thomson . has enabled me to reproduce this correspondence accurately for the first time.”
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- Research Article
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- Copyright © Modern Language Association of America, 1928
References
page 1110 note 1 Quoted in Gebbie and Hunter: Complete Works of Robert Burns. [Self-Inter-preting Edition.] Philadelphia, 1887, V, 15.
page 1110 note 2 The Life and Works of Robert Burns, Ed. by Robert Chambers, Revised by William Wallace, Edinb. and Lond. 1896, IV, 6. Unless otherwise indicated, all page references in the succeeding notes are to this edition.
page 1111 note 3 I gladly take this opportunity to express my thanks to the Trustees of the Morgan Library for their courtesy in permitting me to consult and utilize the unpublished material which supplies the basis of the present paper.
page 1111 note 4 For an example of Currie's handling of manuscripts, see the letter from Burns to Robert Cleghorn, in the Lenox Collection, New York Public Library.
page 1111 note 5 Wallace, IV, 27.
page 1112 note 6 Ibid., IV, 38.
page 1112 note 7 Ibid., IV, 47.
page 1113 note 8 Ibid., IV, 53-54.
page 1113 note 9 Ibid., IV, 131.
page 1113 note 10 Ibid., IV, 136.
page 1113 note 11 Ibid., IV, 140.
page 1114 note 12 Ibid., IV, 150, 151, 154.
page 1114 note 13 Ibid., IV, 166.
page 1114 note 14 Ibid., IV, 173.
page 1114 note 15 Ibid., IV, 260.
page 1114 note 16 Ibid., IV, 275.
page 1115 note 17 Thomson to Burns, 20 Jan., 1793. Wallace, III, 391.
page 1115 note 18 Ibid., III, 392.
page 1115 note 19 IV, 146.
page 1116 note 20 Thomson to Burns, 27 Oct., 1794. IV, 161.
page 1116 note 21 IV, 161.
page 1116 note 22 J. C. Dick: The Songs of Robert Burns.. A Study in Tone Poetry. Henry Frowde, London, etc., 1903. p. 369.
page 1117 note 23 Wallace, IV, 54.
page 1117 note 24 Ibid., IV, 259.
page 1117 note 25 Dick, op. cit., p. 385.
page 1118 note 26 Quoted in Gebbie & Hunter, op. cit., V, 154.
page 1118 note 27 Dick, op. cit., p. xiv.
page 1118 note 28 Wallace, IV, 265.
page 1118 note 29 Both forms are given in Gebbie & Hunter, V, 309.
page 1119 note 30 Wallace, III, 410.
page 1120 note 31 Quoted in Gebbie & Hunter, V, 154.