SCOTLAND'S BARD

Evening Post, Volume CXXIX, Issue 22, 26 January 1940, Page 5

SCOTLAND'S BARD

TITO IM^ ■:.«

CENTENNIAL BURNS DINNER .

Members oE the Wellington Association of Scots Societies turned up ia force at the Masonic Hall last night to honour by a Centennial Burns dinner their national poet in traditional " v manner, by singing his songs, praising = . his -works, and making the welkitt ' ring with the skirling, of the PJP esThe Scots were welcomed by me chairman, Mr. J G. MacKenzie. vj«n« said that the association comprised the Hutt Valley Scottish, Wellug oa , Gaelic, Wellington 'Burns. Wellington* Caledonian, Wellington Scots Social. and St Andrew Burns Clubs, gathered for 'the one hundred and eighty-first t celebration of the birlh oi tteir n* , tional bard. Robert Burns, whose fame increased as the years went by. la 1938 119,242 persons visited his cottaga and monument at Alloway an merea* of 3644 on the number for the previ°UTheeevening was passed with was and dance and good cheer. Burns* most-loved compositions were pre ? . sented by those who loved them besj, , thfStists singing, reciting, dancing. , and piping, and the audience sang tha , TeAwa^ in a fine address, referred to the So of Scotland, expressing m tha lpncuace of the common people all {hat they ever thought or felt when, £ey came face to face with the! reah. ties oMife. It was a great achieve^ hm? She gave him a strong intellect, independent mind, and . |«WJJ , affectionate disposition. His *MJ»JJ were many, but they were those of his v age, and were shared by some of tba greatest of his contemporaries. , 8 "With all his faults we love RoberJ , Burns," said Mr. Sinclair. "We aw claim him the greatest national poet that ever lived. Shakespeare is not £? national poet1 of England. Hava you noticed that he never wrote at single line about anything that oc-j curred in his own lifetime?. And m any case he belongs to the people * all nations, for he ranks with^Homej and Dante, but Burns is the national poet of Scotland.' We mean one wha is the mirror of his country, reflect, ing in song its life, its character, its customs, and those peculiarities where* in it differs from other countries. He endeared himself to the peasantry of Scotland because.he was one oS them. He shared their griefs, their, privations, and poverty, and them , wrongs. But he sang also their loves, their affections, their courtships, and family joys. "Burns sang of Scot--land's proud independent spirit—that >. spirit which has kept her from tna earliest times an unconquered and an . unconquerable land, so that, after 3WJ - years of fighting, the Romans left only, their bones and a few walls as memo- » rials of their presence^ Always mi time of danger that*spirlt'has- become strong and unyielding. Never haa it been stronger than it is today, ana once more the men of the mountains • are coming down to-the sound oftft« pibroch. 'To stand, a wall of fire, , around their much-loved isle.' (Ap* plause.) . I "A generous Government m London gave Burns a position as an excise* man at a starting salary of £34 a year, for which tie, had to travel more than 200 miles a week on horseback in all weathers, 'examining auld wives beer barrels.' as he himself said in disgust. At the same time they gave a pension of £200 a year to a .London , poet that he might continue his liter- « ary labours —Thomas Dibdin —knownl to posterity as the writer of one^ojig, 'Here a Sheer Hulk- Lies Poor Tom , Bowling.' "But Burns continued joyfully on , his way, knowing that he was carving for himself a niche in the heart of Scotland, and almost his last word* to his wife Jean on his death-bed, as he lay in poverty, and neglect, t haunted by the fear of imprisonment - fpr debt, were these: 'Dinna. worry,- > Jean; in anither hundred years I'll _ be mair respected than I am noo. - When he passed away in 1796, at th« early age of 37, the cry-went up all over Scotland: 'Burns is dead!' Th« people made belated atonement for their neglect by raising a fund sufficient to keep Jean in comfort fpr the rest of her days, and inside 25 years every word that the poet wrota or spoke became a matter of national importance." The Ode was given, by Mr. J. t C

Stirling, and the. artists for the? eveni ing were Mrs. J. A. Wiltshire^Miss■■,(».McKay, Messrs. J. B. Thomson^ Thomas -^ Wood, and Hector Stevens:;. ; ,;'; Mrs. = ;;| WJ London was accompanist, ]Piper^Ai; ;I| Barclay the' official piper,; and; Mr.: O» ,; ? B. Stratmore was sorig leader::-;;, v;^;|