[On Hearing It Asserted Falsehood is expressed in the Rev. Dr. Babington’s very looks.] That there is a falsehood in his looks,I must and will deny:They tell their Master is a knave,And sure they do not lie.

Tune–“I am a man unmarried.” Once I lov’d a bonie lass,Ay, and I love her still;And whilst that virtue warms my breast,I’ll love my handsome Nell. As bonie lasses I hae seen,And mony full as braw;But, for a modest gracefu’ mein,The like I never saw. A bonie lass, I will confess,Is pleasant to the e’e;But, […]

I dream’d I lay where flowers were springingGaily in the sunny beam;List’ning to the wild birds singing,By a falling crystal stream:Straight the sky grew black and daring;Thro’ the woods the whirlwinds rave;Tress with aged arms were warring,O’er the swelling drumlie wave. Such was my life’s deceitful morning,Such the pleasures I enjoyed:But lang or noon, loud […]

Tune–“Invercauld’s Reel, or Strathspey.” Choir.–O Tibbie, I hae seen the day,Ye wadna been sae shy;For laik o’ gear ye lightly me,But, trowth, I care na by. Yestreen I met you on the moor,Ye spak na, but gaed by like stour;Ye geck at me because I’m poor,But fient a hair care I.O Tibbie, I hae seen […]

All devil as I am–a damned wretch,A hardened, stubborn, unrepenting villain,Still my heart melts at human wretchedness;And with sincere but unavailing sighsI view the helpless children of distress:With tears indignant I behold the oppressorRejoicing in the honest man’s destruction,Whose unsubmitting heart was all his crime.–Ev’n you, ye hapless crew! I pity you;Ye, whom the seeming […]

Tune–“Go from my window, Love, do.” The sun he is sunk in the west,All creatures retired to rest,While here I sit, all sore beset,With sorrow, grief, and woe:And it’s O, fickle Fortune, O! The prosperous man is asleep,Nor hears how the whirlwinds sweep;But Misery and I must watchThe surly tempest blow:And it’s O, fickle Fortune, […]

Tune–“Galla Water.” Altho’ my bed were in yon muir,Amang the heather, in my plaidie;Yet happy, happy would I be,Had I my dear Montgomerie’s Peggy. When o’er the hill beat surly storms,And winter nights were dark and rainy;I’d seek some dell, and in my armsI’d shelter dear Montgomerie’s Peggy. Were I a baron proud and high,And […]

If ye gae up to yon hill-tap,Ye’ll there see bonie Peggy;She kens her father is a laird,And she forsooth’s a leddy. There Sophy tight, a lassie bright,Besides a handsome fortune:Wha canna win her in a night,Has little art in courtin’. Gae down by Faile, and taste the ale,And tak a look o’ Mysie;She’s dour and […]

In Tarbolton, ye ken, there are proper young men,And proper young lasses and a’, man;But ken ye the Ronalds that live in the Bennals,They carry the gree frae them a’, man. Their father’s laird, and weel he can spare’t,Braid money to tocher them a’, man;To proper young men, he’ll clink in the handGowd guineas a […]

Paraphrase of Jeremiah, 15th Chap., 10th verse. Ah, woe is me, my mother dear!A man of strife ye’ve born me:For sair contention I maun bear;They hate, revile, and scorn me. I ne’er could lend on bill or band,That five per cent. might blest me;And borrowing, on the tither hand,The deil a ane wad trust me. […]

As I was a-wand’ring ae morning in spring,I heard a young ploughman sae sweetly to sing;And as he was singin’, thir words he did say,–There’s nae life like the ploughman’s in the month o’ sweet May. The lav’rock in the morning she’ll rise frae her nest,And mount i’ the air wi’ the dew on her […]

Tune–“Bide ye yet.” O Mary, at thy window be,It is the wish’d, the trysted hour!Those smiles and glances let me see,That make the miser’s treasure poor:How blythely was I bide the stour,A weary slave frae sun to sun,Could I the rich reward secure,The lovely Mary Morison. Yestreen, when to the trembling stringThe dance gaed thro’ […]

Tune–“The Braes o’ Balquhidder.” Chor.–And I’ll kiss thee yet, yet,And I’ll kiss thee o’er again:And I’ll kiss thee yet, yet,My bonie Peggy Alison. Ilk care and fear, when thou art nearI evermair defy them, O!Young kings upon their hansel throneAre no sae blest as I am, O!And I’ll kiss thee yet, yet, etc. When in […]

[The lass is identified as Ellison Begbie, a servant wench, daughter of a “Farmer Lang”.] A Song of Similes Tune–“If he be a Butcher neat and trim.” On Cessnock banks a lassie dwells;Could I describe her shape and mein;Our lasses a’ she far excels,An’ she has twa sparkling roguish een. She’s sweeter than the morning […]

Tune–“Laggan Burn.” Here’s to thy health, my bonie lass,Gude nicht and joy be wi’ thee;I’ll come nae mair to thy bower-door,To tell thee that I lo’e thee.O dinna think, my pretty pink,But I can live without thee:I vow and swear I dinna care,How lang ye look about ye. Thou’rt aye sae free informing me,Thou hast […]

O Thou Great Being! what Thou art,Surpasses me to know;Yet sure I am, that known to TheeAre all Thy works below. Thy creature here before Thee stands,All wretched and distrest;Yet sure those ills that wring my soulObey Thy high behest. Sure, Thou, Almighty, canst not actFrom cruelty or wrath!O, free my weary eyes from tears,Or […]

The wintry west extends his blast,And hail and rain does blaw;Or the stormy north sends driving forthThe blinding sleet and snaw:While, tumbling brown, the burn comes down,And roars frae bank to brae;And bird and beast in covert rest,And pass the heartless day. “The sweeping blast, the sky o’ercast,”The joyless winter dayLet others fear, to me […]

O Thou, the first, the greatest friendOf all the human race!Whose strong right hand has ever beenTheir stay and dwelling place! Before the mountains heav’d their headsBeneath Thy forming hand,Before this ponderous globe itselfArose at Thy command; That Pow’r which rais’d and still upholdsThis universal frame,From countless, unbeginning timeWas ever still the same. Those mighty […]

The man, in life wherever plac’d,Hath happiness in store,Who walks not in the wicked’s way,Nor learns their guilty lore! Nor from the seat of scornful prideCasts forth his eyes abroad,But with humility and aweStill walks before his God. That man shall flourish like the trees,Which by the streamlets grow;The fruitful top is spread on high,And […]

Why am I loth to leave this earthly scene?Have I so found it full of pleasing charms?Some drops of joy with draughts of ill between–Some gleams of sunshine ‘mid renewing storms,Is it departing pangs my soul alarms?Or death’s unlovely, dreary, dark abode?For guilt, for guilt, my terrors are in arms:I tremble to approach an angry […]