The Book of Scottish Song/Prince Charles Edward

Prince Charles Edward.

[David Vedder.—Arranged to a beautiful Gaelic air by Finlay Dun.]

Farewell to thee, Scotland, thy verdure is blighted,
Thy daisies are steeped in the blood of the brave;
And I, who thy wrongs with the sword would have righted,
Am tossed like a fugitive serf on the wave!
Impelled to the pursuit, by gold and by vengeance,
My foemen are swift as the storm-driven rack;
From the fierce brutal tribes they've selected their engines,
The beagles and blood-hounds are scenting my tract.

Farewell to thee, Scotland, thy hills are receding,
So beagles and blood-hounds can track as they may;
But my heart to its centre is wounded and bleeding,
For thousands who fell on Culloden's dark day.
The hill-fox's howl, and the lone widow's wailings,
Commingle at midnight, 'midst tempest and rain;
And the red mountain-streamlets by smouldering shellings,
Brawl hoarsely and fiercely the dirge of the slain.

The chieftains and heroes who followed my banner
Are pining in dungeons, and bleaching on walls;
Or, stripp'd of their all, saving conscience and honour,
The grass growing rank on their hearths and their halls,
Farewell to thee, Scotland, thy loftiest mountain
Is fading and blending with ocean and sky,
I groan—for my tears are dried up at the fountain—
A wanderer I've lived, and an exile I'll die.

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