---
title: "Elegy on the Year 1788"
author: "Robert Burns"
form: "Poem"
year: "1788"
location: "Mossgiel"
source: "Project Gutenberg #1279 — Poems and Songs of Robert Burns"
source_url: "https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/1279/pg1279.txt"
canonical_url: "https://robert-burns.com/poems/elegy-on-the-year-1788/"
---

# Elegy on the Year 1788

## Poem
For lords or kings I dinna mourn,  
E’en let them die—for that they’re born:  
But oh! prodigious to reflec’!  
A Towmont, sirs, is gane to wreck!  
O Eighty-eight, in thy sma’ space,  
What dire events hae taken place!  
Of what enjoyments thou hast reft us!  
In what a pickle thou has left us!

The Spanish empire’s tint a head,  
And my auld teethless, Bawtie’s dead:  
The tulyie’s teugh ’tween Pitt and Fox,  
And ’tween our Maggie’s twa wee cocks;  
The tane is game, a bluidy devil,  
But to the hen-birds unco civil;  
The tither’s something dour o’ treadin,  
But better stuff ne’er claw’d a middin.

Ye ministers, come mount the poupit,  
An’ cry till ye be hearse an’ roupit,  
For Eighty-eight, he wished you weel,  
An’ gied ye a’ baith gear an’ meal;  
E’en monc a plack, and mony a peck,  
Ye ken yoursels, for little feck!

Ye bonie lasses, dight your e’en,  
For some o’ you hae tint a frien’;  
In Eighty-eight, ye ken, was taen,  
What ye’ll ne’er hae to gie again.

Observe the very nowt an’ sheep,  
How dowff an’ daviely they creep;  
Nay, even the yirth itsel’ does cry,  
For E’nburgh wells are grutten dry.

O Eighty-nine, thou’s but a bairn,  
An’ no owre auld, I hope, to learn!  
Thou beardless boy, I pray tak care,  
Thou now hast got thy Daddy’s chair;  
Nae handcuff’d, mizl’d, hap-shackl’d Regent,  
But, like himsel, a full free agent,  
Be sure ye follow out the plan  
Nae waur than he did, honest man!  
As muckle better as you can.

January, 1, 1789.

---

Source: [Project Gutenberg #1279 — Poems and Songs of Robert Burns](https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/1279/pg1279.txt)  
Canonical HTML: https://robert-burns.com/poems/elegy-on-the-year-1788/