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One guinea note with a poem by Robert Burns

Key details

Archive number
NTS/02/25/BRN/02/04
Alt. number
3.6016
Date
1 March 1780
On display
Yes
Creator
Burns, Robert (Author)
Bank of Scotland

Description

One guinea note with a poem by Robert Burns. Twelve lines, signed 'R.B.- Kyle'.

Despite his literary and commercial success, Robert Burns faced financial problems throughout his life. The situation was particularly bleak in the summer 1786 when he seriously considered leaving Scotland to work in Jamaica as a plantation book-keeper. In this poem, written on a Bank of Scotland one guinea note, Robert laments his reliance on money and alludes to his impending departure:

'Wae worth thy pow’r, thou cursed leaf!

Fell source of all my woe and grief!...


For lake o’ thee I leave this much-lov’d shore,

Never perhaps to greet old Scotland more!'

Archive information


Hierarchy

  1. Robert Burns, collection of poems and songs ( )
  2. One guinea note with a poem by Robert Burns