Ah! little did my mother think
      A banish’d man I ’d be,
    Sent frae a’ my kith and kin,
      Them never mair to see.

    Oh! father, ’twas the sugar’d drap
      Aft ye did gi’e to me,
    That has brought a’ this misery
      Baith to you and me.

[66] These verses are here first printed.

WOULD YOU BE YOUNG AGAIN?[67]

AIR—­"Ailen Aroon."

    Would you be young again? 
      So would not I—­
    One tear to memory given,
      Onward I ’d hie. 
    Life’s dark flood forded o’er,
    All but at rest on shore,
    Say, would you plunge once more,
      With home so nigh?

    If you might, would you now
      Retrace your way? 
    Wander through stormy wilds,
      Faint and astray? 
    Night’s gloomy watches fled,
    Morning all beaming red,
    Hope’s smiles around us shed,
      Heavenward—­away.

    Where, then, are those dear ones,
      Our joy and delight? 
    Dear and more dear though now
      Hidden from sight. 
    Where they rejoice to be,
    There is the land for me;
    Fly, time, fly speedily;
      Come, life and light.

[67] This song was composed in 1842, when the author had attained her seventy-sixth year.  The four lays following, breathing the same devotional spirit, appear to have been written about the same period of the author’s life.  The present song is printed from the original MS.

REST IS NOT HERE.

    What ’s this vain world to me? 
      Rest is not here;
    False are the smiles I see,
      The mirth I hear. 
    Where is youth’s joyful glee? 
    Where all once dear to me? 
    Gone, as the shadows flee—­
      Rest is not here.

    Why did the morning shine
      Blythely and fair? 
    Why did those tints so fine
      Vanish in air? 
    Does not the vision say,
    Faint, lingering heart, away,
    Why in this desert stay—­
      Dark land of care!

    Where souls angelic soar,
      Thither repair;
    Let this vain world no more
      Lull and ensnare. 
    That heaven I love so well
    Still in my heart shall dwell;
    All things around me tell
      Rest is found there.

HERE’S TO THEM THAT ARE GANE.

AIR—­"Here ’s a health to ane I lo’e weel."

        Here ’s to them, to them that are gane;
        Here ’s to them, to them that are gane;
    Here ’s to them that were here, the faithful and dear,
      That will never be here again—­no, never. 
        But where are they now that are gane? 
        Oh, where are the faithful and true? 
    They ’re gane to the light that fears not the night,
      An’ their day of rejoicing shall end—­no, never.