Page:The Book of Scottish Song.djvu/146

128 For now-a-days, there's nae sic things

As honest hearts o' Nature's lything;

There'll scarce a body look your way,

Gif that the siller binna kything.

Oh the waefu', &c.

Ye'll no get brose, nor breid, nor cheese,

Nor social drap to weet your wyzon:

What cares the polished man o' wealth,

Though wyzon, wame, and a' gae gyzant?

When lucky stars gi'e 's leave to sit,

Ower comfort's cozy cutchac beeking;

To set your very creepy stule,

Baith rich and puir will aft be seeking.

Oh the waefu', &c.

What, think ye, is't links hands and hearts?

It's nowther beauty, wit, nor carriage;

But, frae the cottage to the ha',

It's siller aye that mak's the marriage.

I've been in luve out ower the lugs,

Like money other chiel afore me;

But, 'cause my mailin was but sma',

The saucy limmers did abhor me.

Oh the waefu', &c.

Hale books I've wrote, baith prose and verse,

And mony a roosing dedication,

But nae ane owned the puir baugh chield,

Sae nocht for me but grim starvation.

And oh, but my ain shanks be sma',

My very nose as sharp's a filler;

Grim death will soon tak' me awa'—

Ohone, ohone, the want o siller!

Oh the waefu', &c.

[ the words and air of this song are said to be the composition of Patrick or, a noted fiddler and rhymer, in Kinghorn, Fifeshire, who flourished towards the close of the 17th and beginning of the 18th centuries, and of whom an excellent portrait by Aikman is still extant at Leslie House. Ramsay, in his Elegy on Patie Birnie, mentions "O wiltu, wiltu do't again," and "The auld man's mear's dead," as songs which Patie "made frae his ain head." We give here two different versions of the song. The second is from "The Scottish Minstrel."]