Here's to the Highlandman's

Bannocks o' barley! Wha in a brulzie

Will first cry a parley? Never the lads wi'

The bannocks o' barley!

Bannocks o' bear meal,

Bannocks o' barley; Here's to the Highlandman's Bannocks o' barley! Wha in his wae-days

Were loyal to Charlie? Wha but the lads wi'

The bannocks o' barley?

HEE BALOU:

[The following is an anglicized version by the

WAE IS MY HEART.

[The subjoined was composed, at Clarke's request, in honour of Phillis M'Murdo of Drumlanrig.]

Tune-"Wae is my heart."

WAE is my heart, and the tear's in my e'e;

Lang, lang, joy's been a stranger to

me:

Forsaken and friendless, my burden I bear,

And the sweet voice o' pity ne'er sounds in my ear.

Love, thou hast pleasures, and deep ha'e I loved;

Love, thou hast sorrows, and sair ha'e I

proved;

But this bruised heart that now bleeds in

my breast,

was first sung to the Poet and then literally translated for him by a lady in the Highlands.]

Tune-"The Highland Balou."

HEE balou! my sweet wee Donald, Picture o' the great Clanronald; Brawlie kens our wanton chief Wha got my young Highland thief.

Leeze me on thy bonnie craigie!
An thou live, thou'll steal a naigie :
Travel the country through and through,
And bring hame a Carlisle cow.

Through the Lowlands, o'er the border, Weel, my babie, may thou furder! Herry the louns o' the laigh countrie, Syne to the Highlands hame to me.

101

at rest.

O, if I were where happy I ha'e been, Down by yon stream and yon bonnie castle-green;

For there he is wandering, and musing

on me,

Wha wad soon dry the tear frae his Phillis's e'e.

-0

HERE'S HIS HEALTH IN WATER.

[The following lines were written upon a hint caught from the refrain of an old song, the memory of which Burns has thus perpetuated.]

Tune-"The Job of Journeywork."

ALTHOUGH my back be at the wa',

And though he be the fautor;

MY LADY'S GOWN, THERE'S GAIRS UPON 'T.

[Here is another flower of song called to life by Burns out of the seemingly dead seed-germ of the burthen of an old, old ditty then almost forgotten. The melody was composed by James Gregg, a musician of Ayrshire.]

Tune-"Gregg's Pipes."

My lord a-hunting he has gane,
But hounds or hawks wi' him are nane;
By Colin's cottage lies his game,
If Colin's Jenny be at hame.

My lady's gown, there's gairs upon 't,
And gowden flowers sae rare upon 't;
But Jenny's jimps and jirkinet,
My lord thinks meikle mair upon 't.

My lady's white, my lady 's red,
And kith and kin o' Cassilis' blude;
But her ten-pound lands o' tocher guid
Were a' the charms his lordship lo'ed.
My lady's gown, &c.

Out o'er yon muir, out o'er yon moss, Whare gor-cocks through the heather pass,

There wons auld Colin's bonnie lass,
A lily in a wilderness.

My lady's gown, &c.

Sae sweetly move her genty limbs,
Like music-notes o' lovers' hymns:
The diamond dew in her een sae blue,
Where laughing love sae wanton swims.
My lady's gown, &c.

My lady 's dink, my lady 's drest,
The flower and fancy o' the west;
But the lassie that a man lo'es best,
O, that's the lass to mak' him blest.
My lady's gown, there's gairs upon 't,
And gowden flowers sae rare upon't ;
But Jenny's jimps and jirkinet,
My lord thinks meikle mair upon 't.

AMANG THE TREES, WHERE HUMMING BEES.

[This was written with all a Scotchman's scorn for the trills and flourishes, the "yell o' foreign squeels," and all the rest of it, abhorred by the lovers of pibroch, reel, and strathspey, in the more fantastic flights of Italian singers and Italian composers. The fiddler in the North, alluded to in the second stanza as having caught something of inspiration from the national predilection for Highland song, evidenced by James the Sixth of Scotland, was Neil Gow, who for eighteen years suffered imprisonment in England.]

Tune-"The King of France, he rode a race." AMANG the trees, where humming bees At buds and flowers were hinging, O, Auld Caledon drew out her drone,

And to her pipe was singing, O; 'T was pibroch, sang, strathspey, or reels, She dirled them aff fu' clearly, O, When there cam' a yell o' foreign squeels, That dang her tapsalteerie, O.

Their capon craws and queer ha, ha's,

They made our lugs grow eerie, O; The hungry bike did scrape and pike,

'Till we were wae and weary, O; But a royal ghaist, wha ance was cased, A prisoner aughteen years awa', He fired a fiddler in the North That dang them tapsalteerie, O.

THE GOWDEN LOCKS OF ANNA.

[According to his own opinion, this was incomparably the finest love song Burns ever produced. It was composed in the spring of 1791, and was placed by him two years afterwards in the hands of Thomson for adaptation to the old Irish melody with which the words, in truth, harmonize to perfection. Thomson, aghast, however, at the intensely impassioned character of the effusion as it originally stood, abstained from including it in his collection; and, to the end that it might not be excluded from the present

edition, a very slight modification has been adventured upon in the second stanza and the postscript.]

Tune-" Banks of Banna."

YESTREEN I had a pint o' wine,

A place where body saw na ; Yestreen lay on this breast o' mine

The gowden locks of Anna. The hungry Jew in wilderness,

Rejoicing o'er his manna, Was naething to my hinny bliss Upon the lips of Anna.

Ye monarchs, tak' the east and west,
Frae Indus to Savannah !
Gi'e me within my fond embrace

The melting form of Anna.
There I'll despise imperial charms,

An empress or sultana, While, locked within her lovely arms, I linger with my Anna!

Awa', thou flaunting god o' day!

Awa', thou pale Diana! Ilk star gae hide thy twinkling ray, When I'm to meet my Anna. Come, in thy raven plumage, Night! Sun, moon, and stars withdrawn a'; And bring an angel pen to write My transports wi' my Anna!

THE WINTER OF LIFE.

[Contributed to Johnson's Museum, this charming song, except in its profound and dominant sadness, is distinctly akin in the tender affection it expresses to that more famous ditty-the finest love song that ever was written for old age"John Anderson, my Jo."]

Tune-" Gil Morice."

BUT lately seen in gladsome green,
The woods rejoiced the day;
Through gentle showers the laughing
flowers

In double pride were gay;

But now our joys are fled

On winter blasts awa';
Yet maiden May, in rich array,
Again shall bring them a'.

But my white pow, nae kindly thowe
Shall melt the snaws of age;
My trunk of eild, but buss or bield,
Sinks in Time's wintry rage.

O, age has weary days,

And nights o' sleepless pain! Thou golden time o' youthfu' prime, Why com'st thou not again?

POSTSCRIPT.

The Kirk and State may join, and tell
To yield me thus I maunna!
The Kirk and State may to the de'il,

And I'll gae to my Anna.
She is the sunshine o' my e'e,—

To live but her I canna ;

Had I on earth but wishes three,
The first should be my Anna.

TO MARY.

[Here is another of those minor ditties long erroneously supposed to have been written by Burns in honour of his Highland Mary. All that the Poet did in their regard was to copy these verses out, as he did also those others beginning "Powers celestial, whose protection," and to get them enshrined in Johnson's collection. There they appeared in association with his name merely from the circumstance of their being in his handwriting. They had already been contributed, however, in 1774. by some unknown lyrical contributor to the Edinburgh Magazine.] Tune-"Could aught of song."

[COULD aught of song declare my pains, Could artful numbers move thee,