Title page from "The Complete Works of Robert Burns"

A steel plate engraving of the cottage where Robert Burns was born, used as a vignette on the title page of an edition of his work.   After Robert Burns' early death in 1796, his friends agreed that a biography of the poet should be written, the proceeds from which would help to support his widow and young family. To this end they selected Dr James Currie, a medical man from Liverpool, originally born in Annan.   The first edition of the biography was published in 1800 and was an immediate success, raising over £1,400. Sadly, Currie's treatment of his subject raised misconceptions about Burns' life which survive to this day. He chose to put a moral slant on the events of the life of the poet and painted a picture of drunkenness and excess in his last years.   This title page is from a later edition of Burns' poems edited by James Currie and containing his biography. It shows the cottage in Alloway, near Ayr where the poet was born.