Page:Studies in Lowland Scots - Colville - 1909.djvu/244

220 There is nothing of the breaking-up of the party in such a self-contained household. But we have the secret homage of the parent-pair (stil en bed-aard spreek toen die Cristen-vader, the grey-haired sire), and the prayer to Him who decks the lily fair in flowery pride (wat met prag die lilies kan beklee=who with pride the lilies kan beclad).

There is of course no eulogy of the simple non-Prelatic services of the home, no patriotic outburst inspired by Old Scotia and Wallace's undaunted heart, but the piece concludes with an almost literal rendering of the Burns couplet,—

The Boer translator is not nearly so successful with "Tam o' Shanter" as with "The Cottars." The rustic setting, the pious sentiment, the Biblical flavour of the latter, seem to elicit a more sympathetic response. In some respects "Tam" should have been equally congenial. The Boer, whether in his oups or in his wanderings among the eerie, baboon-haunted kloofs, is peculiarly susceptible to the influence of unholy spooks on his nerves, a peculiarly Dutch term for bogles that may very plausibly claim kinship with our own Puck and the "wee Pechs" of Scottish folk-lore. The strengthening with initial s is no unusual feature. But Reitz so completely misses the humour of the situation and its inimitably dramatic touches that one wonders if we have here another racial illustration of the joke and the surgical operation. Few fresh features are imported into the tale, and only about a third of the original is used. The piece is entitled "Klaas Geswint en sijn Pêrt," or in German, Nikolas Geschwind (the mobile) und sein Pferd