And knapsack a’ in order;
     His doxy lay within his arm;
     Wi’ usquebae an’ blankets warm
     She blinkit on her sodger;
     An’ aye he gies the tozie drab
     The tither skelpin’ kiss,
     While she held up her greedy gab,
     Just like an aumous dish;
     Ilk smack still, did crack still,
     Just like a cadger’s whip;
     Then staggering an’ swaggering
     He roar’d this ditty up—­

     Air

     Tune—­“Soldier’s Joy.”

     I am a son of Mars who have been in many wars,
     And show my cuts and scars wherever I come;
     This here was for a wench, and that other in a trench,
     When welcoming the French at the sound of the drum. 
     Lal de daudle, &c.

My ’prenticeship I past where my leader breath’d his last, When the bloody die was cast on the heights of Abram:  and I served out my trade when the gallant game was play’d, And the Morro low was laid at the sound of the drum.

     I lastly was with Curtis among the floating batt’ries,
     And there I left for witness an arm and a limb;
     Yet let my country need me, with Elliot to head me,
     I’d clatter on my stumps at the sound of a drum.

     And now tho’ I must beg, with a wooden arm and leg,
     And many a tatter’d rag hanging over my bum,
     I’m as happy with my wallet, my bottle, and my callet,
     As when I used in scarlet to follow a drum.

     What tho’ with hoary locks, I must stand the winter shocks,
     Beneath the woods and rocks oftentimes for a home,
     When the t’other bag I sell, and the t’other bottle tell,
     I could meet a troop of hell, at the sound of a drum.

     Recitativo

     He ended; and the kebars sheuk,
     Aboon the chorus roar;
     While frighted rattons backward leuk,
     An’ seek the benmost bore: 
     A fairy fiddler frae the neuk,
     He skirl’d out, encore! 
     But up arose the martial chuck,
     An’ laid the loud uproar.

     Air

     Tune—­“Sodger Laddie.”

     I once was a maid, tho’ I cannot tell when,
     And still my delight is in proper young men;
     Some one of a troop of dragoons was my daddie,
     No wonder I’m fond of a sodger laddie,
     Sing, lal de lal, &c.

     The first of my loves was a swaggering blade,
     To rattle the thundering drum was his trade;
     His leg was so tight, and his cheek was so ruddy,
     Transported I was with my sodger laddie.

     But the godly old chaplain left him in the lurch;
     The sword I forsook for the sake of the church: 
     He ventur’d the soul, and I risked the body,
     ’Twas then I proved false to my sodger laddie.

     Full soon I grew sick of my sanctified sot,
     The regiment at large for a husband I got;
     From the gilded spontoon to the fife I was ready,
     I asked no more but a sodger laddie.