The Book of Scottish Song/Waly, Waly
Waly, Waly.
[This deeply pathetic song is of undoubted antiquity, but nothing satisfactory can be told regarding its history. According to some accounts, the subject of it is said to have been Lady Barbara Erskine, wife of the second marquis of Douglas, who, in 1670, was abandoned by her husband on account of some scandal, but this is extremely apocryphal, as the song is clearly the lamentation of a forsaken girl, not a wife.]
O waly, waly up the bank,
And waly, waly down the brae,
And waly, waly yon burn-side,
Where I and my love wont to gae!
I lean'd my back unto an aik,
I thoucht it was a trusty tree;
But first it bow'd, and syne it brak:
Sae my true love did lichtlie me.
O waly, waly, but love be bonnie
A little time while it is new;
But when it's auld it waxes cauld,
And fades away like the morning dew.
O wherefore should I busk my heid,
Or wherefore should I kame my hair?
For my true love has me forsook,
And says he'll never love me mair.
Now Arthur's Scat shall be my bed,
The sheets shall ne'er be press'd by me,
St. Anton's Well shall be my drink,
Since my true love has forsaken me.
Martinmas wind, when wilt thou blaw,
And shake the green leaves aff the tree?
O, gentle death, when wilt thou come?
For of my life I am wearie.
'Tis not the frost that freezes fell,
Nor blawing snaw's inclemencie;
'Tis not sic cauld that makes me cry:
But my lore's heart's grown cauld to me.
When we came in by Glasgow toun,
We were a comely sicht to see;
My love was clad in the black velvet,
And I mysel' in cramasie.
But had I wist, before I kiss'd,
That love had been sae ill to win,
I'd lock'd my heart in a case of gold,
And pinn'd it wi' a siller pin.
Oh, oh! if my young babe were born,
And set upon the nurse's knee,
Aud I myself were dead and gane,
And the green grass growing over me!