Apparitions > Aloway Kirk, or, Tam o' Shanter, a tale

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Kings may be blest, but Tam was glorious,
O’er a’ the ills of life victorious! ■
But pleasures are like poppies spread,
You seize the flower, its bloom is shed ;
Or, like the snow falls in the river,
A moment white—then melts for ever :
Or like the Borealis- race,
That flit ere you can point the place
Or like the rainbows Ic/vely form,
Evanishing amid the storm.—
Nae man can tether Time or Tide,
The hour approaches, Tam maun ride ;
That hour, o’ night’s black arch the key-
stane,
That dreary hour he mounts his beast in,;
And sic a night he taks the roadinj
As ne’er poor sinner was abroad in..
The win’ blew as ’twad blawn its last,
The rattlin showers rose on the blast;
The speedy gleams the darkness- swallow’d.
Loud, deep, and lang the thunder bellow’d:
That night a child might understand.
The deil had business on his baud.—
"Weel mounted on his gray mare Meg.
A better never lifted leg, .
Tam skelpt on thro’ dub and mire,
Despising wind, and'rain and fire; *
Whiles bedding fast his gude blew bonnet;
Whiles crooning o’er an auld Scots sonnet,