XVII.
Reading edition
TO MR. JOHN KENNEDY.
[“The small piece,” the very last of his productions, which the poet enclosed in this letter, was “The Mountain Daisy,” called in the manuscript more properly “The Gowan.”]
Mossgiel, 20th April, 1786.
Sir,
By some neglect in Mr. Hamilton, I did not hear of your kind request for a subscription paper ’till this day. I will not attempt any acknowledgment for this, nor the manner in which I see your name in Mr. Hamilton’s subscription list. Allow me only to say, Sir, I feel the weight of the debt.
I have here likewise enclosed a small piece, the very latest of my productions. I am a good deal pleased with some sentiments myself, as they are just the native querulous feelings of a heart, which, as the elegantly melting Gray says, “melancholy has marked for her own.”
Our race comes on a-pace; that much-expected scene of revelry and mirth; but to me it brings no joy equal to that meeting with which your last flattered the expectation of,
Sir,
Your indebted humble servant,
R. B.