Robert Burns

Robert Burns (1759 - 1796)
portrait by Alexander Nasmyth, 1787
Scottish National Portrait Gallery
(wikimedia)
no copyright infringement intended

known also as Scotland's Favorite Son, The Ploughman Poet, Robden of Solway Firth, The Bard of Ayrshire, or simply The Bard, he is the national poet of Scotland; best known of the poets who have written in the Scots language, although much of his writing is also in English and a light Scots dialect, accessible to an audience beyond Scotland; also wrote in standard English, and in these writings his political or civil commentary is often at its bluntest (wikipedia)

this half-length portrait of Burns, framed within an oval, was to be engraved for a new edition of his poems; he is shown fashionably dressed against a landscape, evoking his rural background in Alloway, Ayrshire; Nasmyth, pleased to have recorded Burns' likeness convincingly, decided to leave the painting in a slightly unfinished state (wikimedia)

• Scots Wha Hae

(A Life in Books)