The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1898-01-25
Anniversary Of Birth Of the ln-
mortal Bard.
HE WAS A WORLDS POET
A Noted Critics Estimate of Burns
Work-Its Best Features-His In
spiration-An Americans Lines.

This day is the anniversary of the
birth of Robert Burns, the Scoth bard
are to English speaking people the
most familiar of all rhyme and prob
ably the highest treasured. By his
countrymen there is always formal OBJ
servance of his birthday and the Scot
tish Thistle Club here will celebrate
| it on an elaborate scale this evening.
Robert Burns was born January 25,
| 1859 and died July 81, 1896. Of his
work the eminent scholar J. w. Hales
says:
Of the lyric poets, pure and simple,
of British literature, Burns is certain
ly the chief. Few songs in the langu-
age, in whatever dialect, equal, very
few indeed surpass, the pest Of his.
In no writer has the passion Of the
moment, let it be what it would, love
or wrath or anguish or despair,
moulded itself into words more COM
pletely rejecting it-words of greater
His love-songs are ablaze with pas
sion; his humorous pieces are one in
extinguishable laughter; his despon-
dent shed around them darkness that
may be felt. In many respects it is OBJ
vious to couple him with Byron, differ
ent as they were in birth, and educa-
ton, and associations. They were
both in an eminent degree "bards of
passion and mirth" If for wit the
palm be given to Byron, as perhaps
it should justly be, Burns is the great
er master of passion. No song of By
rons can compare for fire and flame
with Ae fond kiss and then we sever.
| In humOr too the superiority lies with
| the Scotch poet. With all his quick
radiant fancy there was in him a GER
| tain grand tenderness and indulgency
| of nature, which saved him always
| from savagery. He never confOunded
vile men with humanity, gross in
stances with the entire genus. His
nature was singularly free from NOR
| bidness. Rude and uninstructed and
ill-regulated it was in some ways; but
| frank, generous, noble it was always,
and these fine traits are omnipresent
| in his poetry. Light that could salts
| fly his spirit he never saw, or saw
only in sparse glimpses; but indeed of
whom can much more be said? Of
some darkness at least that prevailed
around him he was quickly conscious,
and did what in him lay to dispel it.
| He spoke out plainly and Vehemently,
never to do him mere justice, with
profane and goddess lips; for he was
of really reverent and WOrshipping
soul, and wherever he recognized what
was good and beautiful he bowed his
| face to the ground before it. 1t was
quite consistent with, nay, dissociable
from, this habit of obeisance, that
wherever he beheld what was mean
and foul he assaulted it, though it
might stand in the high place itself.
The intrinsic virtue of his nature is
shown in that seeing around him so
much that was truly ignoble and vici-
Gus, he was never corrupted into a
mere cynic and satirist; but to the
end, with whatever sad lapses of prac-
tice, held firm his faith in true man
illness and honor. His was a life Of
much spiritual disorder and tumult.
Often he beat his wings wildly against
the bars of the world as he saw it; in
calmer moments he sang out his pain,
and whatever joy there might be, in
notes that must for ever awaken a
responsive thrill in the bosom of man
kind.
Perhaps no poet ever more truly
sang because he must" than Burns.
To the ordinary eye there was but
little in his early surroundings to
evoke a poetical spirit. To call him
wholly uneducated is of course a mis-
take; his mental faculties had much
care bestowed upon them; he was
born in an intellectual country; and
such gross unculture, if I may use
such a word, as marks many a we'll
to-do farmer, and others than farm
ers, in England was happily not posi-
BILE for him; but still it seemed as il
everything was against his turning
out a poet Pope, the idol Of the time
could not be inspiring to such nature
as that of Burns. Cowper began tC
write only two or three years before
|, Burns himself. What in the shape ot
composition most moved his genius
was the balladry of his native land
the old popular songs, which had
long died out in England but were
still to be heard across the Border
How active their influence upon his