"His wee bit ingle, blinkin bonilie, His clean hearth-stane, his thrifty wife's smile." So run two lines from Burn's poem, "The Cotter's Saturday Night." It wil mean more to you when you know that the man referred to, the cotter, was Burn's father. His "wee bit ingle," that is the chimney corner, you are looking at in the picture. It is not hard to fancy that it would blink bonnily with a roaring wood fire in it. Nor is it hard to imagine, after seeing the well kept china in the rack, that the hearth stone shone with its many polishings. It was in this room that Burns was born. It looks much as it must have looked in the poet's day. The house consists of two rooms. It is now owned by the Burns Society of Ayr who keep it in order. Here have been gathered together books that belonged to Burns, books that Burns,

stray verses - many things that are connected with the poet's life or with his memory. Burns was born January 25, 1759. His father was a poor, hard-working man with a large family of children. Burns had little education in school, but his father and his mother knew well the few good books they had, and they taught their children honesty and upright living. There was also in the household an old woman by the name of Janet Wilson. It was she and Burns's mother who stored his young mind with Scotch ballads and stories. He heard from them tales of fancy, war, and witches such as had been handed down from father to son from ages past. It was these tales that fires him in after years to sing of the glories of his native land.