Cupid for me interposing,

To my love did bow full low; She from him her hands unloosing,

In contempt struck down his bow.

Angry Cupid from her flying,

Cried out, as he sought the skies, Haughty nymphs their love denying, Cupid ever shall despise."

As he spoke, old Care came wandering, With him stalked destructive Time; Winter froze the streams meandering, Nipped the roses in their prime.

Spectres then my love surrounded,

At their back marched chilling Death; Whilst she, frighted and confounded,

Felt their blasting pois'nous breath:

As her charms were swift decaying, And the furrows seized her cheek; Forbear, ye fiends! I vainly crying, Waked in the attempt to speak.]

THE TEARS OF SCOTLAND.

Dr. Blacklock told me that Smollett, who was at the bottom a great Jacobite, composed these beautiful and pathetic verses on the infamous depredations of the Duke of Cumberland after the battle of Culloden.

[MOURN, hapless Caledonia, mourn
Thy banished peace, thy laurels torn!
Thy sons, for valour long renowned,
Lie slaughtered on their native ground:
Thy hospitable roofs no more
Invite the stranger to the door;
In smoky ruins sunk they lie,
The monuments of cruelty.

The wretched owner sees, afar,
His all become the prey of war;
Bethinks him of his babes and wife,
Then smites his breast and curses life.
Thy swains are famished on the rocks
Where once they fed their wanton flocks;
Thy ravished virgins shriek in vain ;
Thy infants perish on the plain.

What boots it, then, in every clime,

Through the wide-spreading waste of time,
Thy martial glory crowned with praise,
Still shone with undiminished blaze?
Thy towering spirit now is broke,
Thy neck is bended to the yoke:
What foreign arms could never quell
By civil rage and rancour fell.

The rural pipe and merry lay
No more shall cheer the happy day;
No social scenes of gay delight
Beguile the dreary winter night:
No strains but those of sorrow flow,
And nought be heard but sounds of woe:
While the pale phantoms of the slain
Glide nightly o'er the silent plain.

O baneful curse! O fatal morn!
Accursed to ages yet unborn!
The sons against their fathers stood;
The parent shed his children's blood!
Yet when the rage of battle ceased,
The victor's soul was not appeased;
The naked and forlorn must feel
Devouring flames and murd'ring steel.

The pious mother, doomed to death,
Forsaken, wanders o'er the heath;
The bleak wind whistles round her head,
Her helpless orphans cry for bread;
Bereft of shelter, food, and friend,
She views the shades of night descend;
And stretched beneath th' inclement skies,
Weeps o'er her tender babes, and dies.

Whilst the warm blood bedews my veins.
And unimpaired remembrance reigns,
Resentment of my country's fate
Within my filial breast shall beat;
And, spite of her insulting foe,
My sympathizing verse shall flow:
Mourn, hapless Caledonia, mourn
Thy banished peace, thy laurels torn !]

—0—

AH! THE POOR SHEPHERD'S MOURNFUL FATE.

Tune-"Gallashiels."

The old title, "Sour Plums o' Gallashiels," probably was a song to this air, which is now lost.

The tune of "Gallashiels" was composed about the beginning of the present century by the Laird of Gallashiels' piper.

[William Hamilton of Bairgoin, who was the author of this, died at the age of fifty-five, in the March of 1754

АH! the poor shepherd's mournful fate,

When doomed to love and languish, To bear the scornful fair one's hate,

Nor dare disclose his anguish ! Yet eager looks and dying sighs

My secret soul discover;

While rapture, trembling through mine eyes,
Reveals how much I love her.

The tender glance, the reddening cheek,
O'erspread with rising blushes,

A thousand various ways they speak
A thousand various wishes.

For oh! that form so heavenly fair,
Those languid eyes so sweetly smiling,
That artless blush and modest air,
So fatally beguiling!

The every look and every grace,
So charm whene'er I view thee;
'Till death o'ertake me in the chase,
Still will my hopes pursue thee:
Then, when my tedious hours are past,
Be this last blessing given,
Low at thy feet to breathe my last,
And die in sight of heaven.]

—0—

THE MILL, MILL, O!

The original, or at least a song evidently prior to Ramsay's, is still extant. It runs thus :

THE mill, mill, O! and the kill, kill, O!
And the coggin o' Peggy's wheel, O!

The sack and the sieve, and a' she did leave,
And danced the miller's reel, O!

As I cam' down yon water-side,
And by yon shellin'-hill, O!
There I spied a bonnie, bonnie lass,
And a lass that I loved right weel, O!

WE RAN, AND THEY RAN.

The author of "We ran, and they ran," was a Rev. Mr. Murdoch M‘Lennan, minister at Crathie, Dee-side.

[The following are the words of this song, as given in Ritson's Collection. The event celebrated in it was the curiously confused battle of Sheriff-muir, fought on the 13th of March, 1715, the opposing forces being those under the Earl of Mar, on the side of the Chevalier, and those under the Duke of Argyle, on the side of the Government. The left wing of each of the belligerents suffered defeat; but both armies, in spite of having been thus partially routed, claired the victory.

WALY, WALY.

In the west country I have heard a different edition of the second stanza. Instead of the four lines beginning with "When cockle-shells," the other way it ran thus :

O, wherefore need I busk my head,
Or wherefore need I kame my hair,
Sin' my fause luve has me forsook,
And says
he'll never luve me mair?

[O waly, waly, up yon bank,

And waly, waly, down yon brae, And waly, by yon burn-side, '

Where I and my love were wont to gae.

O waly, waly, love is bonnie

A little while, when it is new;
But when it's auld it waxeth cauld,
And fades away like morning dew.
When cockle-shells turn silter bells,

And mussels grow on every tree;
When frost and snaw shall warm us a',
Then shall my luve prove true to me.

I leant my back unto an aik,

I thought it was a trustie tree;
But first it bowed, and syne it brake,
And sae did my fause luve to me.

Now Arthur's Seat shall be my bed,

The sheets shall ne'er be fyled by me: Saint Anton's well shall be my drink,

Since my true luve 's forsaken me. O Mart'mas wind! when wilt thou blaw, And shake the green leaves aff the tree? O gentle Death! whan wilt thou come, And tak' a life that wearies me?

'Tis not the frost that freezes fell,

Nor blawing snaw's inclemencie ; 'Tis not sic cauld that mak's me cry,

But my luve's heart grown cauld to me. Whan we cam' in by Glasgow town,

We were a comely sight to see ; My luve was clad in velvet black, And I mysel' in cramasie.

But had I wist before I kist.

That love had been sae ill to win,

I had lockt my heart in a case of gowd,
And pinned it wi' a siller pin.
Oh, oh! if my young babe were born,
And set upon the nurse's knee,
And I mysel' were dead and gane;
For a maid again I'll never be.]

DUMBARTON DRUMS.

This is the last of the West Highland airs; and from it, over the whole tract of country to the confines of Tweed-side, there is hardly a tune or song that one can say has taken its origin from any place or transaction in that part of Scotland. The oldest Ayrshire reel is "Stewarton Lasses," which was made by the father of the present Sir Walter Montgomery Cunningham, alias Lord Lysle; since which period there has indeed been local music in that country in great plenty. "Johnnie Faa" is the only old song which I could ever trace as belonging to the extensive county of Ayr.

[DUMBARTON drums beat bonnie, O!
When they mind me of my dear Johnnie, O!
How happy am I

When my soldier is by,

While he kisses and blesses his Annie, O!
'Tis a soldier alone can delight me, O!
For his graceful looks do unite me, O!
While guarded in his arms,

I'll fear no war's alarms,
Neither danger nor death shall e'er fright me, O!

My love is a handsome laddie, O!
Genteel, but ne'er foppish nor gaudie, O!
Though commissions are dear,
Yet I'll buy him one this year,
For he shall serve no longer a caddie, O!
A soldier has honour and bravery, O!
Unacquainted with rogues and their knavery, O!
He minds no other thing

But the ladies or the King,

For every other care is but slavery, O!

Then I'll be the Captain's lady, O! Farewell all my friends and my daddie, O! I'll wait no more at home,

But I'll follow with the drum,

And whene'er that beats I'll be ready, O!
Dumbarton drums sound bonnie, O!
They are sprightly, like my dear Johnnie, 01
How happy shall I be

When on my soldier's knee,
And he kisses and blesses his Annie, O!]