The Modern Scottish Minstrel Volume Ii Part 43

They were of course the princ.i.p.al sufferers.

[155] An allusion to the provocation given to the Macdonalds of Clanra.n.a.ld, Glengarry, and Keppoch, by being deprived of their usual position--the right wing. Their motions are supposed to have been tardy in consequence. The poet was himself in the right wing.

[156] The unfortunate night-march of the Highlanders is described with historic truth and great poetic effect.

[157] Roy Stuart lived and died in the belief (most unfounded, it seems), that Lord George Murray was bribed and his army betrayed.

[158] Military orders received from the Court of St Germains.

[159] The Duke of c.u.mberland.

JOHN MORRISON.

John Morrison was a native of Perthshire. Sometime before 1745 he was settled as missionary at Amulree, a muirland district near Dunkeld. In 1759 he became minister of Petty, a parish in the county of Inverness.

He obtained his preferment in consequence of an interesting incident in his history. The proprietor of Delvine in Perthshire, who was likewise a Writer to the Signet, was employed in a legal process, which required _a diligence_ to be executed against one of the clan Frazer. A design to waylay and murder the official employed in the _diligence_ had been concerted. This came to the knowledge of a clergyman who ministered in a parish chiefly inhabited by the Lovat tenantry. The minister, afraid of openly divulging the design, on account of the unsettled nature of his flock, begged an immediate visit from his friend, Mr Morrison, who speedily returned to Perthshire with information to the laird of Delvine. The Frazers found the authority of the law supported by a sufficient force; and Mr Morrison was rewarded by being presented, through the influence of the laird of Delvine, to the parish of Petty.

Amidst professional engagements discharged with zeal and acceptance, Morrison found leisure for the composition of verses. Two of his lyrics are highly popular among the Gael; one of them we offer as a specimen, and an improved version of the other will afterwards appear in the present work. Mr Morrison died in November 1774.

MY BEAUTY DARK.

The heroine of this piece was a young lady who became the author's wife, upon an acquaintance originally formed by the administration of the ordinance of baptism to her in infancy.

My beauty dark, my glossy bright, Dark beauty, do not leave me; They call thee dark, but to my sight Thou 'rt milky white, believe me.

'Twas at the tide of Candlemas,[160]

Came tirling at my door, The image of a lovely la.s.s That haunts me evermore.

Beside my sleeping couch she stood, And now she mars my rest; Still as I try the solemn mood, She hunts it from my breast.

At lecture and at study That ankle white I span, Its sandal slim, its lacings trim,-- A fay I seem to scan.

Thy beauty 's like a drift of spray That dashes to the side, Or like the silver-tail'd that play Their gambols in the tide.

As heaps of snow on mountain brow When shed the clouds their fleece, Or churn of waves when tempest raves, Thy swelling limbs in grace.

Thy eyes are black as berries, Thy cheeks are waxen dyed, And on thy temple tarries The raven's dusk, my pride!

Gives light below each slim eye-brow A swelling orb of blue, In April meads so glance the beads, In May the honey-dew.

Dark, tangled, deep, no drifted heap, But sheaf-like, neatly bound Thy tresses seem, in braids, or stream As bright thine ears around.

Those raven spires of hair, that fair, That turret-bosom's shine!

False friends! from me that banish'd thee, Who fain would call thee mine.

No lilts I spin, their love to win, The viol strings I shun, But lend thine ear and thou shalt hear My wisdom, dearest one!

[160] Evidently a Valentine morning surprise.

ROBERT MACKAY.

THE HIGHLANDER'S HOME SICKNESS.

We have been favoured by Mr William Sinclair with the following spirited translation of Mackay's first address to the fair-haired Anna, the heroine of the "Forsaken Drover" (vol. i. p. 315). In the enclosures of Crieff, the Highland bard laments his separation from the hills of Sutherland, and the object of his love.

Easy is my pillow press'd But, oh! I cannot, cannot rest; Northwards do the shrill winds blow-- Thither do my musings go!

Better far with thee in groves, Where the young deers sportive roam, Than where, counting cattle droves, I must sickly sigh for home.

Great the love I bear for her Where the north winds wander free, Sportive, kindly is her air, Pride and folly none hath she!

Were I hiding from my foes, Aye, though fifty men were near, I should find concealment close In the shieling of my dear.

Beauty's daughter! oh, to see Days when homewards I 'll repair-- Joyful time to thee and me-- Fair girl with the waving hair!

Glorious all for hunting then, The rocky ridge, the hill, the fern; Sweet to drag the deer that 's slain Downwards by the piper's cairn!

By the west field 'twas I told My love, with parting on my tongue; Long she 'll linger in that fold, With the kine a.s.sembled long!

Dear to me the woods I know, Far from Crieff my musings are; Still with sheep my memories go, On our heath of knolls afar: Oh, for red-streak'd rocks so lone!

Where, in spring, the young fawns leap, And the crags where winds have blown-- Cheaply I should find my sleep.

END OF VOL. II.