Page:The Book of Scottish Song.djvu/387

Rh I've seen the morning

With gold the hills adorning,

And loud tempest storming before the mid-day.

I've seen Tweed's silver streams,

Shining in the sunny beams,

Grow drumly and dark as he row'd on his way.

Oh, fickle Fortune,

Why this cruel sporting?

Oh, why still perplex us, poor sons of a day?

Nae mair your smiles can cheer me,

Nae mair your frowns can fear me;

For the Flowers of the Forest are a wede away.

[ by to the tune of the "Flowers of the Forest." This is a versification of the evening song sung by the negro women, who gave food and shelter to poor Mungo Park when about to perish. "The air," says Park, "was plaintive, and the words literally translated were these: 'The winds roared, and the rains fell, the poor white man, faint and weary, came and sat under our tree. He has no mother to bring him milk, he has no wife to grind his corn: let us pity the white man, no mother has he.]

winds they were roaring,

The rains they were pouring,

When, lonely, the white man, a wonder to see!

Both hungry and weary,

Desponding and dreary,

He came, and he sat in the shade of our tree.

No mother is by him,

With milk to supply him;

He wanders an outcast, how sad must he be!

Even corn, could he find it,

He has no wife to grind it—

Let us pity the white man, no mother has he!

[ of the early productions of. It has been set to music by Mrs. Gibson.]

, ye gay landscapes, ye gardens of roses,

In you let the minions of luxury rove;

Restore me the rocks where the snow-flake reposes,

If still they are sacred to freedom and love.

Yet, Caledonia, beloved are thy mountains,

Round their white summits tho' ekments war,

Tho' cataracts foam 'stead of smooth flowing fountains,

I sigh for the valley of dark Loch-na-gar.

Ah! there my young footsteps in infancy wandered;

My cap was the bonnet, my cloak was the plaid:

On chieftains, long perish'd, my memory pondered,

As daily I strayed through the pine-covered glade.

I sought not my home till the day's dying glory

Gave place to the rays of the bright polar-star;

For fancy was cheered by traditional story,

Disclosed by the natives of dark Loch-na-gar.

Shades of the dead! have I not heard your voices,

Rise on the night-rolling breath of the gale?

Surely the soul of the hero rejoices,

And rides on the wind o'er his own Highland vale.

Round Loch-na-garr, while the stormy mist gathers,

Winter presides in his cold icy car;

Clouds there encircle the forms of my fathers,

They dwell 'mid the tempests of dark Loch-na-gar.

[ by. In the life of the poet, it is stated, that on one occasion, while taking a solitary walk, his musings were interrupted by the voice of a country-girl, who was singing a song of his own, "We'll meet beside the dusky-glen, on yon burn-side." This, he used to say, gave him great satisfaction, as an accidental and unconscious evidence of the rising popularity of his songs.]

meet beside the dusky glen on yon burn-side,

Where the bushes form a cozie den, on yon burn-side:

Though the broomy knowes be green,

Yet there we may be seen;

But we'll meet—we'll meet at e'en, down by yon burn-side.