Page:The Book of Scottish Song.djvu/37

Rh "Na na!" quo' the panky auld wife, "I trow,

You'll fash na' your head wi' a youthfu' gilly,

As wild and as skeigh as a muirland filly,

Black Madge is far better and fitter for you

He hem'd and he haw'd and be screw'd in his mouth,

And he squeez'd his blue bonnet his twa hands between,

For wooers that come when the sun's in the south,

Are mair aukwart than wooers that come at e'en.

"Black Madge she is prudent."—"What's that to me?"

"She is eident and sober, has sense in her noddle,

Is douse and respeckit."—"I care na a boddle.

I'll baulk na' my luive, and my fancy's free."

Madge toss'd back her head wi' a saucy slight,

And Nanny ran laughing out to the green;

For wooers that come whan the sun shines bright,

Are no like the wooers that come at e'en.

Awa' flung the laird and loud muttered he,

"All the daughters of Eve, between Orkney and Tweed, O,

Black and fair, young and old, dame, damsel and widow,

May gang wi' their pride to the deil for me!"

But the auld gudewife and her Mays sae tight,

For a' his loud banning cared little, I ween;

For a wooer that comes in braid day-light,

Is no like a wooer that comes at e'en.

[ song is to be found in Herd's collection of 1776. Burns made some slight alterations on it for Johnson's Museum. Old king Coul, according to fabulous Scottish history, flourished in the fifth century, and was father of the giant Fin M'Coul. Coila (Ayrshire) was under his sway.]