Works

They mustered us up with a royal din,
In wearisome weeks of drought.
Ere ever half of the crops were in,
Or the half of the sheds cut out.

'Twas down with the saddle and spurs and whip...

Tune - "Awa Whigs, awa."


Chorus.

Awa Whigs, awa!
Awa Whigs, awa!
Ye're but a pack o' traitor louns,
Ye'll do nae good at a'.

I
...

Out from behind this bending, rough-cut Mask,
(All straighter, liker Masks rejected - this preferr'd,)
This common curtain of the face, contain'd in me for me, in you for you, in each for each,...

[As Told in 1880.]

Year of '71, children, middle of the fall,
On one fearful night, children, we well-nigh lost our all.
True, it wa'n't no great sum we had to lose that night,...

Tune - "Charlie Gordon's welcome hame."


I.

Out over the Forth I look to the north,
But what is the north and its Highlands to me?
The south nor the east gie ease to my breast,...

I, who was always counted, they say,
Rather a bad stick any way,
Splintered all over with dodges and tricks,
Known as "the worst of the Deacon's six;"
I, the truant, saucy and bold,...

Over the hills and far away,
A little boy steals from his morning play
And under the blossoming apple-tree
He lies and he dreams of the things to be:
Of battles fought and of victories won,...

1.
Tom he was a piper's son,
He learnt to play when he was young;
But all the tunes that he could play
Was "Over the hills and far away."
Over the hills and a great way off,...

(See Note)

Wonder I must, what I once may see
Over the lofty mountains!
Eyes shall meet only snow, may be;
Standing here, each evergreen tree
Over the heights is yearning; -...

An owl took, in a barn, a station
As fittest for deep contemplation;
There (like a Turk) upon a beam
He sat, as Turks sit in hareem.

So smokers, at the Magpie met,...

(To a Mother.)


Yes, I have seen your eyes maternal
Beam, as beam forth the stars eternal,
Intercommuning of your joys -
Sayings and doings of your boys.
Nature, in body and in mind,...

Lift thy head, thou undaunted youth!
Though some hope may now break, forsooth,
Brighter a new one and higher
Shall throe eye fill with its fire.

Lift thy head to the vision clear!...

Blow, Father Triton, blow your wreath'd horn
Cheerly, as is your wont, and let the blast
Circle our island on the breezes borne;
Blow, while the shining hours go swiftly past....

I shall not ask Jean Jaques Rousseau[1]
If birds confabulate or no;
'Tis clear, that they were always able
To hold discourse, at least in fable;
And e'en the child who knows no better...

(To a Young Heir.)


No sooner was thy father's death
Proclaimed to some, with bated breath,
Than every gambler was agog
To win your rents and gorge your prog.
...

Pan loved his neighbour Echo - but that child
Of Earth and Air pined for the Satyr leaping;
The Satyr loved with wasting madness wild
The bright nymph Lyda, and so three went weeping....

To R.K. Leather
(July 16th, 1892.)

PAOLO AND FRANCESCA

It happened in that great Italian land
Where every bosom heateth with a star -
At Rimini, anigh that crumbling strand...

I who e're while the happy Garden sung,
By one mans disobedience lost, now sing
Recover'd Paradise to all mankind,
By one mans firm obedience fully tri'd
Through all temptation, and the Tempter foil'd...

Perplex'd and troubl'd at his bad success
The Tempter stood, nor had what to reply,
Discover'd in his fraud, thrown from his hope,
So oft, and the perswasive Rhetoric...

"He holds a pistol to my head,
Swearing that he will shoot me dead,
If he have not my purse instead,
The robber!"

"He, with the lash of wealth and power,
Flogs out my heart and flings the dower,...