accounts. They are practically unanimous in praise of the taste and
tact with which he acquitted himself. While neither shy nor
aggressive, he impressed every one with his brilliance in
conversation, his shrewdness in observation, and criticism, and his
poise and common sense in his personal relations. One of the best
descriptions of him was given by Sir Walter Scott to Lockhart. Scott
as a boy of sixteen met Burns at the house of Doctor Adam Ferguson,
and thus reports:

"His person was strong and robust; his manners rustic, not
clownish; a sort of dignified plainness and simplicity, which
received part of its effect perhaps from one's knowledge of his
extraordinary talents.... I would have taken the poet, had I not
known what he was, for a very sagacious country farmer of the old
Scotch school; that is, none of your modern agriculturists who
keep labourers for their drudgery, but the _douce guidman_ who
held his own plough. There was a strong expression of sense and
shrewdness in all his lineaments: the eye alone, I think,
indicated the poetical character and temperament. It was large,
and of a cast which glowed (I say literally glowed) when he spoke
with feeling or interest. I never saw such another eye in a human
head, though I have seen the most distinguished men of my time.
His conversation expressed perfect self-confidence, without the
slightest presumption. Among the men who were the most learned of
their time and country, he expressed himself with perfect
firmness, but without the least intrusive forwardness; and when he
differed an opinion, he did not hesitate to express it firmly, yet
at the same time with modesty.... I have only to add, that his
dress corresponded with his manner. He was like a farmer dressed
in his best to dine with the laird. I do not speak _in malam