several hymns and paraphrases corresponding with those in the Assembly's selection. These too have been claimed as being Bruce's; but on such untenable grounds, that, before Mr Grosart's advent, no editor of. Bruce's works felt warranted in inserting them.

It appears, from a letter by Logan to Dr Carlyle, that he had doubts about the success of his poems, and was anxious to obtain the opinions of judges before committing himself. As to the profits, he says, "If I can pay the expenses of my jaunt [to London] by this publication, I shall be very well pleased." This year also he published the substance of a course of lectures on the Philosophy of History, which he delivered in Edinburgh; and, on account of their favourable reception, he became a candidate for the chair of history in the University of Edinburgh. He was unsuccessful however, for Mr Fraser Tytler (Lord Woodhouselee) was selected for the appointment.

In 1783, Logan wrote Runnamede, a tragedy founded on Magna Charta, which was accepted by the manager of Covent Garden Theatre, but was prohibited from appearing by the Lord Chancellor, on the ground of the subject being political. But worse for the author than its stoppage was the effect upon his congregation; for, coupled with the fact of his having contracted irregular and indulgent habits, it led to his having to resign his charge in 1786, with an annuity out of the stipend. He then went to reside in London, and devoted himself entirely to literature. He became a contributor to the English Review, and wrote a defence of Warren Hastings,

for which the publisher was prosecuted. This trial gave occasion for one of Erskine's most famous speeches, and the publisher was unanimously acquitted by the jury.

Logan did not long survive his removal to London, for he died in December 1788.

It is not our province to defend Logan's character as a man, or as a poet, from legitimate criticism, and we have already indicated our opinion of his blunder in reference to Bruce's poems; but we are only doing our duty in using the right which all literary men are entitled to exercise against the use of unfair weapons, in giving expression to our indignation at an attack of which the following is but a single sample :

--

"In the course of my literary researches I have been brought pretty near to Logan, by his own letters, by letters of contemporaries, by anecdotes, and other data, and know not that a more false life has ever been lived-the worst of all falsity, moreover, seeing it is a serving the devil while wearing Christ's livery. It may be needful, some day, to reveal all, though personally I should prefer silence, save only where Bruce's claims come in for defence."-Note to Grosart's Works of Michael Bruce, p. 108. Edinburgh, 1865.

behalf of Bruce, would be yielding to clamour that which can only be given | up on the most convincing proofs of Logan's fraud.

Logan left a large quantity of manuscripts at his death. Two volumes of selections from his sermons were considered worthy of publication by his executors; but, though they reached a fifth edition, like most of that class of literature, they are now forgotten. The selection of his poems which follow gives a high idea of the correctness of his taste, and the chasteness and simplicity of his style as a poet; and his sermons are characterized by Dr Carruthers, in the last edition of Chambers' Cyclopedia of English Literature (who also maintains his claim to the "Ode "), as "warm and passionate, full of piety and fervour."

ODE TO THE CUCKOO.

I.

Hail, beauteous Stranger of the wood!
Attendant on the Spring!
Now heav'n repairs thy rural seat,
And woods thy welcome sing.

II.

Soon as the daisy decks the green,
Thy certain voice we hear:
Hast thou a star to guide thy path,
Or mark the rolling year?

III.

Delightful visitant! with thee

I hail the time of flow'rs,

When heav'n is fill'd with music sweet Of birds among the bow'rs.

IV.

The schoolboy wand'ring in the wood
To pull the flow'rs so gay,
Starts, thy curious voice to hear,
And imitates thy lay.

V.

Soon as the pea puts on the bloom,
Thou fly'st thy vocal vale,

An annual guest, in other lands,
Another Spring to hail.

VI.

Sweet bird! thy bow'r is ever green,
Thy sky is ever clear;
Thou hast no sorrow in thy song,
No winter in thy year!

VII.

Alas! sweet bird! not so my fate,
Dark scowling skies I see
Fast gathering round, and fraught with

woe

And wintry years to me.'

VIII.

O could I fly, I'd fly with thee:

We'd make, with social wing, Our annual visit o'er the globe, Companions of the Spring.

A VISIT TO THE COUNTRY IN AUTUMN.

'Tis past! no more the summer blooms! Ascending in the rear,

Behold congenial autumn comes,

The Sabbath of the year!
What time thy holy whispers breathe
The pensive evening shade beneath,

And twilight consecrates the floods;
While Nature strips her garment gay,
And wears the vesture of decay,

O! let me wander through the sounding woods.

This verse did not appear in the poem as published by Logan, but was found among his manuscripts. With this exception, the version given is that of the first edition, 1770.

Ah! well-known streams! Ah! wonted

groves,

Still pictured in my mind!
Oh! sacred scene of youthful loves,
Whose image lives behind!
While sad I ponder on the past,
The joys that must no longer last;

The wild flower strown on summer's bier,

The dying music of the grove,

And the last elegies of love,

Dissolve the soul, and draw the tender tear!

Alas! the hospitable hall

Where youth and friendship play'd, Wide to the winds a ruin'd wall

Projects a death-like shade!

The charm is vanish'd from the vales;
No voice with virgin whispers hails

A stranger to his native bowers:
No more Arcadian mountains bloom,
Nor Enna valleys breathe perfume,

The fancied Eden fades with all its flowers.

Companions of the youthful scene,

Endear'd from earliest days! With whom I sported on the green, Or roved the woodland maze! Long exiled from your native clime, Or by the thunder-stroke of time Snatch'd to the shadows of despair; I hear your voices in the wind, Your forms in every walk I find,

I stretch my arms; ye vanish into a

My steps, when innocent and young,
These fairy paths pursued ;
And, wandering o'er the wild, I sung
My fancies to the wood.

I mourn'd the linnet-lover's fate,
Or turtle from her murder'd mate,

Condemn'd the widow'd hours to wail.
Or, while the mournful vision rose,
I sought to weep for imaged woes,
Nor real life believed a tragic tale!

THE BRAES OF YARROW.

"Thy braes were bonnie, Yarrow stream, When first on them I met my lover; Thy braes how dreary, Yarrow stream, When now thy waves his body cover! For ever, now, O Yarrow stream,

Thou art to me a stream of sorrow! For never on thy banks shall I

Behold my love, the flower of Yarrow.

He promised me a milk-white steed,

To bear me to his father's bowers; He promised me a little page,

To squire me to his father's towers; He promised me a wedding-ring

The wedding-day was fix'd to-morrow; Now he is wedded to his grave,

Alas, his watery grave, in Yarrow !

Sweet were his words when last me met; My passion I as freely told him! Clasp'd in his arms, I little thought

That I should never more behold him! Scarce was he gone, I saw his ghost;

It vanish'd with a shriek of sorrow; Thrice did the water-wraith ascend, And gave a doleful groan through Yarrow.

His mother from the window looked,
With all the longing of a mother;
His little sister weeping walked
The greenwood path to meet her

brother:

They sought him east, they sought him west,

No longer seek him east or west,

And search no more the forest thorough! For, wandering in the night so dark,

He fell a lifeless corpse in Yarrow.

The tear shall never leave my cheek; No other youth shall be my marrow : I'll seek thy body in the stream,

And then with thee I'll sleep in Yarrow." The tear did never leave her cheek; No other youth became her marrow; She found his body in the stream, And now with him she sleeps in Yarrow.

THE REIGN OF MESSIAH.
Behold! the mountain of the Lord
In latter days shall rise
Above the mountains and the hills,
And draw the wondering eyes.

To this the joyful nations round,

All tribes and tongues, shall flow; Up to the hill of God, they'll say,

And to His house we'll go.

The beam that shines on Zion hill
Shall lighten every land;
The King who reigns in Zion towers
Shall all the world command.

No strife shall vex Messiah's reign,
Or mar the peaceful years;
To ploughshares soon they beat their
swords,

To pruning-hooks their spears.

rough

They only saw the cloud of night,
They only heard the roar of Yarrow !

No longer from thy window look;

Thou hast no son, thou tender mother! No longer walk, thou lovely maid; Alas, thou hast no more a brother!

Their millions slain deplore; They hang the trumpet in the hall,

And study war no more.

Come then-O come from every land,
To worship at His shrine :
And, walking in the light of God,
With holy beauties shine.