The Sun.
London, England, 1842-05-09 00:00:00

A sister of Burns, the last survivor of his father's
family, still lives. She is now a widow, at an ad-
vanced age, and resides at the village of Tranent, in
Haddingtonshire, with two unmarried daughters,
who endeavour to support her by the exercise of their
needles. She is a decent-looking old person, with a
good deal of the poet's physiognomy, and particularly
his fine dark eyes. The youngest of William Barns's
children, she was twelve years old at the time when
he died at Lochlea, a broken-spirited man. She was
one of the household at Mossgiel during its occupancy
by Robert and Gilbert Burns in succession, and she
afterwards married a person named Begg, who, for
ten years, conducted the business of Gilbert's farm of
Dunning, on the estate of Sir Charles S. Monteath,
of Closeburn. Since the death of her husband, her
sons being all removed from her, and unable to assist
her, she has been dependent on her two daughters,
who, though active and most respectable young
women, are barely able to keep house for themselves
and their venerable parent. in short, the sister of
Burns has fallen, in the course of Providence, into
poverty, and her last years are threatened with those
distresses, the dread of which is the theme of so many
of her brother's verses. I was much affected on hear-
ing her say that having, in her earliest years, been
witness of the troubles which lowered over her fa-
ther's house, having afterwards partaken of the hard-
ships at Mossgiel, having passed through a long mar-
ried life in circumstances at no titne esay, and
being now -reduced to absolute indigence, she felt
as if she had walked side., by side with grief from
her very childhood. One only alleviation of her
fate has sprung from the . fame of her brother,
in the shape of the most trifling annual pittance from
the Scottish Exchequer. She was lately a candidate
for the benefit of a fund called the Craig-Crook Mor-
tification [Anflice endowment] ; but her application
for the meantime failed. lam satisfied, from rigid
inquiries, that Mrs. Begg and her two daughters are
perfectly worthy persons, and that complaint would
never have been heard from them, if the most self-
devoted industry on the part of the young women
were sufficient to keep their mother in comfort. The
public is, doubtless, much taxed ; but, on the other
hand, some claims are sacred. The poems of Burns
daily give delight to thousands, and will continue to
do so for a'es. His productions wax yearly in public
esteem, as time passes on and brings no second Burns.
The name of the Ayrshire bard has even been asso-
ciated by some living writers with those of which
England is proudest. While he soars so high, to think
of one so near and dear to him as a sister sinking into
penury—hearing from a cold ingle-cheek the echoes of
a nation's acclaim at every mention of the name she
hears—she, the last of the real members of that group
which, as a poetical picture, must live for ever in the
" Cotter's Saturday Night"—in short, the " sister of
Burns"—to think of all this, is more than I can sup-
pose the public patiently enduring, burdened as it is.
—Correspondent of the Inverness Courier.