The Book of Scottish Song/The Wanton Wife

The Wanton Wife.

[Allan Cunningham.]

Nith, trembling to the reaper's sang,
Warm glitter'd in the harvest sun,
And murmured down the lanesome glen,
Where a wife of wanton wit did won.
Her tongue wagged wi' unhaly wit,
Unstent by kirk or gospel bann,
An' aye she wished the kirkyard mools
Green growing o'er her auld gudeman.

Her auld gudeman drapped in at e'en,
Wi' harvest heuk—sair toiled was he;
Sma' was his cog and cauld his kail,
Yet anger never raised his e'e;
He blessed the little, and was blithe,
While spak' the dame, wi' clamorous tongue,
O sorrow clap your auld beid pow,
And dance wi' ye to the mools, gudeman!

He hang his bonnet on the pin,
And down he lay, his dool to drie;
While she sat singing in the neuk,
And tasting at the barley bree.
The lark, 'mid morning's siller gray,
That wont to cheer him warkward gaun,
Next morning missed amang the dew
The blithe and dainty auld gudeman.

The third morn's dew on flower and tree
'Gan glorious in the sun to glow,
When sung the wanton wife to mark
His feet gaun foremost o'er the knowe.
The first flight o' the winter's rime
That on the kirkyard sward had faun,
The wanton wife skiffed aff his grave,
A-kirking wi' her new gudeman.

A dainty dame I wat was she,
High brent and burnished was her brow,
'Mang lint-locks curling; and her lips
Twin daisies dawned through honey dew.
And light and loesome in the dance,
When ha' was het, or kirn was won;
Her breasts twa drifts o' purest snaw,
In cauld December's bosom faun.

But lang ere winter's winds blew by,
She skirled in her lonesome bow;
Her new gudeman, wi' hazle rung,
Began to kame her wanton pow.
Her hearth was slokent out wi' care,
Toom grew her kist and cauld her pan,
And dreigh and dowie waxed the night,
Ere Beltane, wi' her new gudeman.

She dreary sits 'tween naked wa's,
Her cheek ne'er dimpled into mirth;
Half-happit, haurling out o' doors,
And hunger-haunted at her hearth.
And see the tears fa' frae her een,
Warm happin' down her haffits wan;
But guess her bitterness of saul
In sorrow for her auld gudeman!

---