The Complete Works of Robert Burns Part 284

The old name of this air is, "the Blossom o' the Raspberry." The song is Dr. Blacklock's.

YOUNG DAMON.

This air is by Oswald.

KIRK WAD LET ME BE.

Tradition in the western parts of Scotland tells that this old song, of which there are still three stanzas extant, once saved a covenanting clergyman out of a sc.r.a.pe. It was a little prior to the revolution, a period when being a Scots covenanter was being a felon, that one of their clergy, who was at that very time hunted by the merciless soldiery, fell in, by accident, with a party of the military. The soldiers were not exactly acquainted with the person of the reverend gentleman of whom they were in search; but from suspicious circ.u.mstances, they fancied that they had got one of that cloth and opprobrious persuasion among them in the person of this stranger. "Ma.s.s John" to extricate himself, a.s.sumed a freedom of manners, very unlike the gloomy strictness of his sect; and among other convivial exhibitions, sung (and some traditions say, composed on the spur of the occasion) "Kirk wad let me be," with such effect, that the soldiers swore he was a d----d honest fellow, and that it was impossible _he_ could belong to those h.e.l.lish conventicles; and so gave him his liberty.

The first stanza of this song, a little altered, is a favourite kind of dramatic interlude acted at country weddings, in the south-west parts of the kingdom. A young fellow is dressed up like an old beggar; a peruke, commonly made of carded tow, represents h.o.a.ry locks; an old bonnet; a ragged plaid, or surtout, bound with a straw rope for a girdle; a pair of old shoes, with straw ropes twisted round his ankles, as is done by shepherds in snowy weather: his face they disguise as like wretched old age as they can: in this plight he is brought into the wedding-house, frequently to the astonishment of strangers, who are not in the secret, and begins to sing--

"O, I am a silly auld man, My name it is auld Glenae," &c.

He is asked to drink, and by and bye to dance, which after some uncouth excuses he is prevailed on to do, the fiddler playing the tune, which here is commonly called "Auld Glenae;" in short he is all the time so plied with liquor that he is understood to get intoxicated, and with all the ridiculous gesticulations of an old drunken beggar, he dances and staggers until he falls on the floor; yet still in all his riot, nay, in his rolling and tumbling on the floor, with some or other drunken motion of his body, he beats time to the music, till at last he is supposed to be carried out dead drunk.

MUSING ON THE ROARING OCEAN.

I composed these verses out of compliment to a Mrs. M'Lachlan, whose husband is an officer in the East Indies.

BLYTHE WAS SHE.

I composed these verses while I stayed at Ochtertyre with Sir William Murray.--The lady, who was also at Ochtertyre at the same time, was the well-known toast, Miss Euphemia Murray, of Lentrose; she was called, and very justly, "The Flower of Strathmore."

JOHNNIE FAA, OR THE GYPSIE LADDIE.

The people in Ayrshire begin this song--

"The gypsies cam to my Lord Ca.s.silis' yett."--

They have a great many more stanzas in this song than I ever yet saw in any printed copy.--The castle is still remaining at Maybole, where his lordship shut up his wayward spouse, and kept her for life.

TO DAUNTON ME.

The two following old stanzas to this tune have some merit:

"To daunton me, to daunton me, O ken ye what it is that'll daunton me?-- There's eighty-eight and eighty-nine, And a' that I hae borne sinsyne, There's cess and press and Presbytrie, I think it will do meikle for to daunton me.

But to wanton me, to wanton me, O ken ye what it is that wad wanton me-- To see gude corn upon the rigs, And banishment amang the Whigs, And right restor'd where right sud be, I think it would do meikle for to wanton me."

THE BONNIE La.s.s MADE THE BED TO ME.

"The Bonnie La.s.s made the Bed to me," was composed on an amour of Charles II. when skulking in the North, about Aberdeen, in the time of the usurpation. He formed _une pet.i.te affaire_ with a daughter of the house of Portletham, who was the "la.s.s that made the bed to him:"--two verses of it are,

"I kiss'd her lips sae rosy red, While the tear stood blinkin in her e'e; I said, My la.s.sie, dinna cry, For ye ay shall make the bed to me.

She took her mither's holland sheets, And made them a' in sarks to me; Blythe and merry may she be, The la.s.s that made the bed to me."

ABSENCE.

A song in the manner of Shenstone.

This song and air are both by Dr. Blacklock.

I HAD A HORSE AND I HAD NAE MAIR.

This story is founded on fact. A John Hunter, ancestor to a very respectable farming family, who live in a place in the parish, I think, of Galston, called Bar-mill, was the luckless hero that "had a horse and had nae mair."--For some little youthful follies he found it necessary to make a retreat to the West-Highlands, where "he feed himself to a _Highland_ Laird," for that is the expression of all the oral editions of the song I ever heard.--The present Mr. Hunter, who told me the anecdote, is the great-grandchild of our hero.

UP AND WARN A' WILLIE.

This edition of the song I got from Tom Niel, of facetious fame, in Edinburgh. The expression "Up and warn a' Willie," alludes to the Crantara, or warning of a Highland clan to arms. Not understanding this, the Lowlanders in the west and south say, "Up and _waur_ them a'," &c.

A ROSE-BUD BY MY EARLY WALK.

This song I composed on Miss Jenny Cruikshank, only child of my worthy friend Mr. William Cruikshank, of the High-School, Edinburgh. This air is by a David Sillar, quondam merchant, and now schoolmaster in Irvine. He is the _Davie_ to whom I address my printed poetical epistle in the measure of the Cherry and the Slae.