"The moorcock that craws on the brows o' Ben-Connal,
He kens o' his bed in a sweet mossy hame;
The eagle that soars o'er the cliff's of Clan-Ronald,
Unawed and unhunted his eriy can claim;
The solan can sleep on his shelve on the shore;
The cormorant roost on his rock of the sea;
But oh! there is ane whose hard fate I deplore,
Nor house, ha', nor hame, in his country has he;
The conflict is past, and our name is no more,
There's nought left but sorrow for Scotland an' me.
"The target is torn from the arms of the just,
The helmet is cleft on the brow of the brave,
The claymore for ever in darkness must rust;
But red is the sword of the stranger and slave;
The hoof of the horse, an' the foot of the proud,
Have trod o'er the plumes on the bonnet o' blue:
Why slept the red bolt in the breast of the cloud,
When tyranny revelled in the blood of the true?
Farewell, my young hero, the gallant and good!
The crown of thy father is torn from thy brow."
Dumbarton's Drums.
[This appears in the first vol. of the Tea-Table Miscellany, (1724). Nothing is known of the author. The song does not relate to the drums of the garrison of Dumbarton on the Clyde, (as many suppose it does,) but to a British regiment, called, as was then the custom, after its first commander, the Earl of Dumbarton, Dumbarton's regiment. The Earl was attached to the Stuart family, and died an exile in France in 1692.]
Dumbarton's drums beat bonnie, O,
When they mind me of my dear Johnnie, O;
How happie 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 invite 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 gaudy, O.
Though commissions are dear,
Yet I'll buy him one this year,
For he'll serve no longer a cadie, 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 daddy, 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's drums sound bonnie, O,
They are sprightly like my dear Johnnie, O.
How happy shall I be
When on my soldier's knee,
And he kisses and blesses his Annie, O!
The Old Man's Song.
[Written by the Rev. John Skinner to the tune of "Dumbarton's Drums." The picture here drawn of contented old age was one realized in the venerable author's own life.]
O! why should old age so much wound us, O?
There is nothing in't all to confound us, O;
For how happy now am I,
With my old wife sitting by,
And our bairns and our oyes all around us, O.
We began in the world wi' naething, O,
And we've jogged on and toiled for the ae thing, O;
We made use of what we had,
And our thankfu' hearts were glad,
When we got the bit meat and the claithing, O.
We have lived all our lifetime contented, O,
Since the day we became first acquainted, O;
It's true we've been but poor,
And we are so to this hour,
Yet we never pined nor lamented, O.
We ne'er thought o' schemes to be wealthy, O,
By ways that were cunning or stealthie, O;
But we always had the bliss—
And what farther could we wiss?—
To be pleased wi' ourselves and be healthy, O.
What though we canna boast of our guineas, O,
We have plenty of Jockies and Jeanies, O;
And these, I'm certain, are
More desirable by far,
