Genealogical memoirs of the family of Robert Burns and of the Scottish house of Burnes

THE FAMILY OF ROBERT BURNS. 37
years, and £45 thereafter. To stock the farm, Mr Ferguson
gave his tenant a loan of £100. On his lease William
Burnes entered at Whitsuntide 1766, and proceeded to
cultivate his lands with his wonted industry. But the soil
proved coarse and barren; and encountering on the death
of his benefactor, Provost Ferguson, harsh usage from a
merciless factor (depicted in his son's poem of the "Twa
Dogs "), he, at the expiry of eleven years, quitted Mount
Oliphant. At Whitsuntide 1777, he obtained the lease of
Lochlea, a considerable farm in the parish of Tarbolton, and
for several years he and his family enjoyed at this place a
degree of comfort to which they had been strangers. But a
dispute arose as to the conditions of the lease, and the matter
being submitted to arbitration, William Burnes found himself
by the decision a ruined man. Only a short time surviving
his reverses, he died on the 13th February 1784, aged sixty-
three. His remains were deposited in the churchyard of
Alloway, where a simple tombstone was, by his son the poet,
erected to his memory. When the poet became famous,
visitors to the churchyard struck off and carried away chips
from the tombstone till it wholly disappeared. It was sub-
stituted by another, reared at the cost of Mr David Auld, a
patriotic gentleman of the neighbourhood. The inscription
was composed by the poet :
" This Stone was Erected to the
Memory of
William Burness,
Late Fanner in Lochlie, Parish of Tarbolton,
Who died Feby. 13, 1784, Aged 63 years,
And was buried here.
ye whose cheek the tear of pity stains,
Draw near with pious rev'rence and attend !
Here lie the loving Husband's dear remains,
The tender Father, and the gen'rous Friend ;