Explore "Prologue Spoken at the Theatre of Dumfries" by Robert Burns on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
On New Year's Day Evening, 1790.
No song nor dance I bring from yon great city, / That queens it o'er our taste-the more's the pity: / Tho' by the bye, abroad why will you roam? / Good sense and taste are natives here at home: / But not for panegyric I appear, / I come to wish you all a good New Year! / Old Father Time deputes me here before ye, / Not for to preach, but tell his simple story: / The sage, grave Ancient cough'd, and bade me say, / "You're one year older this important day," / If wiser too-he hinted some suggestion, / But 'twould be rude, you know, to ask the question; / And with a would-be roguish leer and wink, / Said-"Sutherland, in one word, bid them Think!"