Page:Poems that every child should know (ed. Burt, 1904).djvu/133

Rh Cauld blew the bitter biting north

Upon thy early, humble birth;

Yet cheerfully thou glinted forth

Amid the storm,

Scarce reared above the parent earth

Thy tender form.

The flaunting flowers our gardens yield,

High sheltering woods and wa's maun shield,

But thou, beneath the random bield

O' clod or stane,

Adorns the histie stibble-field,

Unseen, alane.

There, in thy scanty mantle clad,

Thy snawie bosom sunward spread,

Thou lifts thy unassuming head

In humble guise;

But now the share uptears thy bed,

And low thou lies!

Such is the fate of artless maid,

Sweet floweret of the rural shade!

By love's simplicity betrayed,

And guileless trust,

Till she, like thee, all soiled, is laid

Low i' the dust.

Such is the fate of simple bard,

On life's rough ocean luckless starr'd

Unskilful he to note the card

Of prudent lore,

Till billows rage, and gales blow hard,

And whelm him o'er!