Robert Ainslie

Death Ainslie died in 1838, aged 71, in Canongate. Edinburgh. He is buried in St. Cuthbert's Churchyard. His memorial inscription reads:

Sacred to the memory of Robert Ainslie, Writer to the Signet who was born at Berrywell near Duns on 13th. January 1767 and died at Edinburgh on 11th. April 1838 in the 72nd. year of his age. This memorial is erected by his disconsolate widow, Isabella Munro, daughter of the late Rev. Robert Munro, Ullapool Ross-shire.

Association with Robert Burns Dugald Stewart commented that Burns was keeping "not very select society". He meant that Alexander Cunningham, Peter Hill, Robert Ainslie and others in Burns's circle, while respectable, were not of the literati. Ainslie, training to be a lawyer, became a close friend of both Cunningham and Burns; As a student Ainslie lived at No.6, St James's Square in Edinburgh and his near neighbours were George Thomson the music publisher, the artist John Beugo, the engraver and Alexander Nasmyth the painter, all of whom were more or less closely associated with Burns's career. Ainslie was 21, seven years younger than Burns, when they met. Burns and Ainslie passed through Haddington on their way to Duns.

Following Burns's death Gilbert Burns wrote to Ainslie:"I could not help considering the fame of author as well as the respectability and peace of his friends in considerable danger from the publication of letters written on private and confidential subjects." He was concerned that the antiquarian and author, Cromek, had obtained many of Burns's letters and requested that when Ainslie was in London he should call upon Cromek and report back.

Border tour 1787 Ainslie, having been granted two weeks leave, accompanied Burns on his travels and the pair left Edinburgh on 5 May 1787 beginning the first stage of the Borders Tour. At Eyemouth they both were inducted as Royal Arch Masons at St Abb's Lodge: Ainslie had to pay a fee but Burns was excused on account of his poetic genius. Ainslie had been Initiated into Scottish Freemasonry in Lodge Holyrood House (St Luke's), No.44, on 12 December 1783; Burns had been Initiated in a Masonic Lodge in Tarbolton, Ayrshire, in 1781.

At Coldstream Ainslie suggested that Burns should cross to England for the first time in his life. Ainslie crossed first, followed by Burns who fell to his knees and is said to have quoted the last two patriotic verses of "The Cotter's Saturday Night" - "O Scotia! my dear, my native soil! For whom my warmest wish to Heaven is sent! Long may thy hardy sons of rustic toil Be blest with health, and peace, and sweet content! And O! may Heaven their simple lives prevent From Luxury's contagion, weak and vile! Then, howe'er crowns and coronets be rent, A virtuous populace may rise the while, And stand a wall of fire around their much-lov'd Isle."

Etc.

Burns at Duns met Ainslie's family and described Robert Ainslie senior as an "uncommon character", informed on matters relating to "Agriculture, natural philosophy and politics." He also commented in his sporadic Border's Journal on Ainslie's sister Rachel, saying that "My bardship's heart got a brush from Miss Betsey'; I could grasp her with a rapture on a bed of straw, and rise with contentment to the most sweltering drudgery of stiffening labour." Reformers Memorial, Kilmarnock. Burns was a covert member of the Society of Friends. Reformers Memorial. The leaders were treated with great severity by the government.

Confidences Burns introduced Ainslie to Agnes Maclehose It was Ainslie for instance who broke the news to Agnes of Burns's marriage.

As a friend of both Agnes and Robert the Jenny Clow affair was difficult for Ainslie, however he may have been involved in the writ in "meditatione fugae" taken out against Burns by Jenny, who was Agne's maid, to prevent him emigrating, etc. Burns wrote acknowledging this on 9 March 1789.

In August 1790 his friend William Nicol wrote to Ainslie lampooning Burns for his ambition for promotion in the Excise and his revelling in pride when he achieved it : "... To the pride of applauded genius is now superadded the pride of office. He was lately raised to the dignity of an Examiner of Excise, which is a step preparative to attaining that of a supervisor."

Ainslie reported to Agnes Maclehose on 18 October 1790 that Burns in September or early October had suffered a bout of Quinsy, a rare and potentially serious complication of tonsillitis where an abscess forms between one of the tonsils and the wall of the throat.

Calling in at Dunlop House in October 1790 Ainslie gave Frances Dunlop a part of the draft of 'Tam o'Shanter'. Agnes was so enthusiastic about this work that Ainslie later sent her the entire text and she soon wrote to Burns in admiration of it. Ainslie later presented a manuscript copy of Tam o'Shanter to Sir Walter Scott.

On 15 October 1791 Ainslie visited Burns and Jean Armour at Ellisland Farm at kirn-nicht or harvest home, although he never mentions it in his correspondence and in fact they essentially ceased any correspondence for two years after the visit. Ainslie wrote to Agnes Maclehose in a derogatory vein ragearding Jean's coarse manners and drab appearance, Jean was heavily pregnant with William Nicol Burns at the time. The reality of his friend's life was clearly a shock to Ainslie.

"In politics if thou would'st mix, And mean thy fortunes be; Bear this in mind, be deaf and blind, Let Great folks hear and see."

It was Ainslie who visited Alexander Cunningham as a lawyer on behalf of Agnes Maclehose to demand the return of the letters that she had written to Burns.

Correspondence with Burns Over 20 letters from Burns to Ainslie have survived. On the other hand, all of Ainslie's letters to Burns were later acquired by Ainslie, who destroyed them. Burns shared with Ainslie many of his intimate thoughts, feelings and opinions and his friend was closely involved with some of his infidelities.

The infamous 'horse litter' letter of 3 March 1788 is one of a number that Ainslie made available for publication, despite's Ainslie's religious ideals, greatly tarnishing the poet's reputation in the process, more than any other of Burns's friends.

On 23 July 1787, writing from Mauchline, he said of Ainslie "There is one thing for which I set great store by you as a friend, and it is this - that I have not a friend upon earth, beside yourself, to whom I can talk nonesense without forfetting some degree of his esteem."

Burns wrote to Ainslie on 3 March 1788 in regard of renting Ellisland Farm. He was accompanied by James Tennant of Glenconner, his "auld comrade dear and brither sinner." Burns rated him as "the most intelligent, sensible fsrmer in the county" and took his advice to take on Ellisland, a choice that he was soon to regret.

The infamous 'horse litter' letter was written on 3 March 1788 to Ainslie. The original letter may be the one that the antiquarian book-seller James Stillie and a group of friends purchased for £4 and put into the fire in an attempt to protect the bards reputation. Ainslie destroyed his correspondence to Burns, so the full context of this unfortunate letter is not known. The Merry Muses contains the full text of the letter. Stillie commented that "This Ainslie was one of Burns' worst enemies, and an odious character." Dr Mackenzie's house in Mauchline where Burns rented a room for Jean Armour's confinement. Burns wrote in 1788 in an undated and unsigned note to Ainslie regarding May Cameron, a servant girl who had fallen pregnant to Burns and had lost her job as a consequence. Burns asked him to: "send for the wench and give her ten or twelve shillings... and advise her out to some country (friends)... Call immediately, or at least as soon as it is dark, for God's sake lest the poor soul be starving. — Ask her for a letter I wrote her just now, by way of token " Burns added the telling instruction, "but don't for Heaven's sake meddle with her as a Piece. I insist on this, on your honor. You may not perhaps not like the business, but I just tax your friendship thus far". To his great annoyance Burns had to repay Ainslie the cost of a sitting with Mr John Mier's after a Mr Hamilton of Bangour in Ireland cheated Burns by charging the bill for his silhouette portrait to him.

William Nicol was one of Burns's most irascible friends and following a careless remark to another mutual friend, William Cruikshank, Nicol threatened to have Burns "summonds to compear and declare" for passing on a very negative assessment of Nicol made by Agnes Maclehose. Burns wrote to Ainslie about this situation on 23 August 1788, the context being a court case that Nicol was fighting against a Dr. Adams.

On 6 January 1789 Burns wrote to Ainslie to say that he hoped to be Edinburgh in February to meet Jenny and to "settle the matter with her, and free her hand of the process." Jenny refused Burn's attempt to take the child off her hands.

In 1789 Burns wrote of his attitude towards his job with the Excise, saying "I have the same consolation which I once heard a recruiting sergeant gave to his audience in the streets of Kilmarnock: 'Gentlemen for your further encouragement, I can assure you that ours is the most blackguard corps under the crown, and, consequently, with us an honest fellow has the surest chance of preferment.

Circa May 1792 Burns wrote to Ainslie at a very low ebb "... My wife scolds me, my business torments me, and my sins come staring me in the face, every one telling a more bitter tale than his fellow. When I tell you that even Bawdry has lost its power to please, you will guess something of my hell within, and all around me."

On 26 April 1793 Burns wrote again in a depressed mood and included a witty story of a subscriber to the reading library he was involved in to whom he "advised him, instead of turning over the leaves, to bind the book on his back." As a result the subscriber took to carrying heavy tomes on his back in the expectation of somehow absorbing their wisdom.

Works Ainslie published:

Practical Observations for the Landed and Agricultural Interest on the Question of Corn and Money: In a Series of Letters, as from a Plain Man (1816) A Father's Gift to his Children (1818), devotional. This work is identified by Brian Reffin Smith as a typical it-narrative. The book contained a reply to "E. Bradwardine Waverley", a pseudonym used by John Wilson Croker in controversy that year with Sir Walter Scott on currency questions. Ainslie gave Scott a manuscript copy by Burns of the poem Tam o' Shanter. Reasons for the Hope that is in Us (1831), devotional. He added "Welcome, Sir, to the society, the venerable Society, of FATHERS!!!" He also suggested that his son's middle name should be 'Burns'.

Ainslie married Jean Cunningham on 22 December 1798, two years after his friend's death, and they had one son and several daughters together.