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FAMOUS SONGS
folk possess the gift of making homely verses, and many a piece has found its way into the world anonymously, to find a reciprocating wel-come in many a heart and home. But, though Burns did not write this song, which is included in nearly every collection of his poems pub-lished, he was the first to give it to the world in the form which we now know and sing it. In-deed, many pieces have been attributed to Burns which he never wrote; the text of Burns has been as much tampered with, perhaps, as that of any ancient or classic author, and requires to be as carefully revised. This, unfortunately, is true not only with respect to words and phrases, but with respect to whole stanzas and poems erroneously ascribed to him and regularly in-cluded in the posthumous editions of his works. It would not be difficult to enumerate at least a dozen pieces in some of the best editions which are certainly not by him Many injudi-cious Burnsites have been too anxious to over-exalt a reputation that already stood and stands as high almost as any poet could wish. It was Carlyle's fancy to represent Burns as an illiterate prodigy who, without models, or with models only of the meanest sort, attained by sheer force of native talent to a foremost place in contem-porary literature; but this is all wrong ; Burns
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