Burns Paper Database

Notes

Description:
Ink on paper. Note with Burns's autograph addressed one side to John Ballantyne Esq.

Previously recorded information:
To Mr Ballantyne. Ayr. Simpson's (1786?)

Notes:
Note enclosing verse See Ferguson Roy Letters I: "Wallace, 1896. Here collated with the original MS. in the National Library of Scotland. Previous editors have suggested that this letter pre-dated Letter 51. Each of the letters, it was suggested, contained The Brigs of Ayr, which seems highly unlikely. It appears probable that at Mossgiel Burns wrote Letter 51 intending to send the poem with it to Ballantine, but failed to do so, perhaps because he planned shortly to make a trip to Ayr. He probably did so a few days later and sent the poem and this note to Ballantine from Simpson's tavern where he waited for his friend to join him."

Reference: Letters 51C (3)

Document Images

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Watermark Images

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