Robert Burns, the national poet of Scotland, published his first book of poems and the rest was history, but prior to publishing the Kilmarnock edition, life was looking pretty bleak for Burns. He seriously contemplated taking up a friend's offer of employment in Jamaica as a sugar plantation overseer. Thankfully, his first slim volume was a resounding success and life became 'sugar sweet' for Robert, for a while.

Robert Burns in Jamaica



I'll take the boat to Jamaica
and try my hand as a plantation man
nothing for me here at home,
just hard labour on poor Mossgiel farm

Dusky maidens all around
I'll find my love in Kingston town,
I will hear the African drums
Jamaica soon will sing Robert Burns

Old Scotia, tho' it breaks my heart
I must leave my native land
I'm no' thriving here at a', at a'
no mansion like a tobacco lord

I'll work for freedom, I give my word
my dusky wife around the house
a life as rich as Newton Mearns
and lots of little brown-eyed bairns

Across the lang sea lanes
Fortune may yet come my way
A Scottish poet must find his ship
and sail away to Jamaic-ay!