THE BIRTHDAY OF BUMS

Otago Daily Times, Issue 17532, 25 January 1919, Page 5

THE BIRTHDAY OF BUMS

[Communicated.]

It has often been said that no poet ha? touched the heart of humanity like Robert Burns. To-day will ba the 160£h anm•yersary of his birth, and the day will, as usual, be celebrated the world over. Carlyle said that Burns was the most gifted British soul we had in all that century of his. In that century many great men, many good men, were acting their parts, but none of them is so lovingly remembered as Burns. If has been asserted that Scotsmen have made too much of him, but their enthusiasm is explained by the fact that the race has produced only one Burns. In his owi domain he has no rival, nor is likely to have. Think of the patriots whose pulses have quickened with new life, the souls that have learned a. deeper sympathy with nature and , , their fellows, the masked hypocrisy his satire has unveiled, the throbbing breasts to whose passion of tenderness he lias given expression! His countrymen, and the many keep, .students of his works in other lands, have good reason for, the or proud devotion to his memory and admira tion of his genius.