Thank you Ian! I should have guessed there'd be a Burns web site. It clears up my misreading of "twa fold" (and how obvious the word now appears!) which fits with "hirples" -- he's limping mightily -- though I'm still fuzzy on "dow" (and presume that a "beld pow" is indeed, as I misread it, a bald one. Of course, I still don't know where my scrap of paper came from.... BTW, for those who find the word "daunton" a puzzle, just think of our "undaunted."