"Here's freedom to him that wad read,
Here's freedom to him that wad write;
There's nane ever feared that the truth should be heard
But them wham the truth wad indite."


Yet his enthusiasm for the cause was scarce guided by wisdom.
Many stories are preserved of the bitter and unwise words he
used in country coteries; how he proposed Washington's health
as an amendment to Pitt's, gave as a toast "the last verse of
the last chapter of Kings," and celebrated Dumouriez in a
doggrel impromptu full of ridicule and hate. Now his
sympathies would inspire him with SCOTS, WHA HAE; now involve
him in a drunken broil with a loyal officer, and consequent
apologies and explanations, hard to offer for a man of
Burns's stomach. Nor was this the front of his offending.
On February 27, 1792, he took part in the capture of an armed
smuggler, bought at the subsequent sale four carronades, and
despatched them with a letter to the French Assembly. Letter
and guns were stopped at Dover by the English officials;
there was trouble for Burns with his superiors; he was
reminded firmly, however delicately, that, as a paid
official, it was his duty to obey and to be silent; and all
the blood of this poor, proud, and falling man must have
rushed to his head at the humiliation. His letter to Mr.
Erskine, subsequently Earl of Mar, testifies, in its turgid,
turbulent phrases, to a perfect passion of alarmed self-
respect and vanity. He had been muzzled, and muzzled, when
all was said, by his paltry salary as an exciseman; alas! had
he not a family to keep? Already, he wrote, he looked