Robert Burns

Address, Spoken by Miss Fontenelle, on Her Benefit-night, December 4, 1793, at the Theatre, Dumfries

STILL anxious to secure your partial favour,
And not less anxious, sure, this night, than ever,
A Prologue, Epilogue, or some such matter,
‘Twould vamp my bill, said I, if nothing better;
So sought a Poet, roosted near the skies,
Told him I came to feast my curious eyes;
Said nothing like his works was ever printed;
And last, my Prologue-business slily hinted.
‘Ma’am, let me tell you,’ quoth my man of rhymes,
‘I know your bent-these are no laughing times:
Can you-but, Miss, I own I have my fears-
Dissolve in pause, and sentimental tears?
With laden sighs, and solemn-rounded sentence,
Rouse from his sluggish slumbers fell Repentance,
Paint Vengeance as he takes his horrid stand,
Waving on high the desolating brand,
Calling the storms to bear him o’er a guilty land?’
  I could no more-askance the creature eyeing,
D’ye think, said I, this face was made for crying?
I’ll laugh, that’s poz-nay, more, the world shall know it;
And so, your servant! gloomy Master Poet!
  Firm as my creed, Sire, ‘tis my fix’d belief,
That Misery’s another word for Grief;
I also think-so may I be a bride!
That so much laughter, so much life enjoy’d.
  Thou man of crazy care and ceaseless sigh,
Still under bleak Misfortune’s blasting eye;
Doom’d to that sorest task of man alive-
To make three guineas do the work of five:
Laugh in Misfortune’s face- the beldam witch!
Say you’ll be merry, the’ you can’t be rich.
  Thou other man of care, the wretch in love,
Who long with jiltish arts and airs hast strove;
Who, as the boughs all temptingly project,
Measur’st in desperate thought-a rope-thy neck-
Or, where the beetling cliff o’erhangs the deep,
Peerest to meditate the healing leap:
Would’st thou be cur’d, thou silly, moping elf?
Laugh at her follies-laugh e’en at thyself:
Learn to despise those frowns now so terrific,
And love a kinder: that’s your grand specific.
  To sum up all, be merry, I advise;
And as we’re merry, may we still be wise.