“My neebours,”
she sang, “aften jeer me,
An’ ca’
me daft haluckit Meg,
An’ say they expect
soon to hear me,
I’ the kirk,
for my fun, get a fleg.
An’ now, ’bout
my marriage they ’ll clatter,
An’ Geordie,
puir fallow, they ca’
An auld doited hav’rel,—nae
matter,
He ‘ll keep
me aye brankin an’ braw.
“I grant ye, his face
is kenspeckle,
That the white
o’ his e’e is turn’d out,
That his black beard is rough
as a heckle,
That his mou’
to his lug ’s rax’d about;
But they needna let on that
he ’s crazie,
His pikestaff
will ne’er let him fa’;
Nor that his hair ’s
white as a daisy,
For fient a hair
has he ava’.
“But a weel-plenish’d
mailin has Geordie,
An’ routh
o’ gude gowd in his kist,
An’ if siller comes
at my wordie,
His beauty I never
will miss ’t.
Daft gowks, wha catch fire
like tinder,
Think love-raptures
ever will burn?
But wi’ poortith, hearts
het as a cinder,
Will cauld as
an iceshugle turn.
“There ’ll just
be ae bar to my pleasures,
A bar that ‘s
aft fill’d me wi’ fear,
He ’s sic a hard near-be-gawn
miser,
He likes his saul
less than his gear.
But though I now flatter his
failin’,
An’ swear
nought wi’ gowd can compare,
Gude sooth! it shall soon
get a scailin’,
His bags sall
be mouldie nae mair!
“I dreamt that I rode
in a chariot,
A flunkie ahint
me in green;
While Geordie cried out he
was harriet,
An’ the
saut tear was blindin’ his een.
But though ‘gainst my
spendin’ he swear aye,
I’ll hae
frae him what ser’s my turn;
Let him slip awa’ whan
he grows wearie;
Shame fa’
me, gin lang I wad mourn!”
But Geordie, while Meg was
haranguin’,
Was cloutin’
his breeks i’ the bauks;
An’ whan a’ his
failin’s she brang in,
His strang hazel
pikestaff he taks,
Designin’ to rax her
a lounder,
He chanced on
the lather to shift,
An’ down frae the bauks,
flat ’s a flounder,
Flew like a shot
starn frae the lift!
MY DEAR LITTLE LASSIE.
My dear little lassie, why,
what ‘s a’ the matter?
My heart it gangs
pittypat—winna lie still;
I ‘ve waited, and waited,
an’ a’ to grow better,
Yet, lassie, believe
me, I ‘m aye growin’ ill!
My head ‘s turn’d
quite dizzy, an’ aft, when I ‘m speakin’,
I sigh, an’
am breathless, and fearfu’ to speak;
I gaze aye for something I
fain would be seekin’,
Yet, lassie, I
kenna weel what I would seek.