She has a long poem on Mary Queen of Scots:—­

   “Queen Mary was much loved by all,
    Both by the great and by the small;
    But hark! her soul to heaven doth rise,
    And I suppose she has gained a prize;
    For I do think she would not go
    Into the awful place below. 
    There is a thing that I must tell,—­
    Elizabeth went to fire and hell! 
    He who would teach her to be civil,
    It must be her great friend, the divil!”

She hits off Darnley well:—­

   “A noble’s son,—­a handsome lad,—­
    By some queer way or other, had
    Got quite the better of her heart;
    With him she always talked apart: 
    Silly he was, but very fair;
    A greater buck was not found there.”

“By some queer way or other”; is not this the general case and the mystery, young ladies and gentlemen?  Goethe’s doctrine of “elective affinities” discovered by our Pet Maidie.

SONNET TO A MONKEY.

   “O lively, O most charming pug! 
    Thy graceful air and heavenly mug! 
    The beauties of his mind do shine,
    And every bit is shaped and fine. 
    Your teeth are whiter than the snow;
    Your a great buck, your a great beau;
    Your eyes are of so nice a shape,
    More like a Christian’s than an ape;
    Your cheek is like the rose’s blume;
    Your hair is like the raven’s plume;
    His nose’s cast is of the Roman: 
    He is a very pretty woman. 
    I could not get a rhyme for Roman,
    So was obliged to call him woman.”

This last joke is good.  She repeats it when writing of James the Second being killed at Roxburgh:—­

   “He was killed by a cannon splinter,
    Quite in the middle of the winter;
    Perhaps it was not at that time,
    But I can get no other rhyme!”

Here is one of her last letters, dated Kirkcaldy, 12th October, 1811.  You can see how her nature is deepening and enriching:—­

“MY DEAR MOTHER,—­You will think that I entirely forget you but I assure you that you are greatly mistaken.  I think of you always and often sigh to think of the distance between us two loving creatures of nature.  We have regular hours for all our occupations first at 7 o’clock we go to the dancing and come home at 8 we then read our Bible and get our repeating, and then play till ten, then we get our music till 11 when we get our writing and accounts we sew from 12 till 1 after which I get my gramer, and then work till five.  At 7 we come and knit till 8 when we dont go to the dancing.  This is an exact description.  I must take a hasty farewell to her whom I love, reverence and doat on and who I hope thinks the same of

“MARJORY FLEMING.

“P.S.—­An old pack of cards (!) would be very exeptible.”

This other is a month earlier:—­