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Auld carle, your suit give o'er,

Your love lyes a' in tawking.

Gi'e me the lad that's young and tight,

Sweet like an April meadow; 'Tis sic as he can bless the sight And bosom of a widow.

"O widow, wilt thou let me in? I'm pawky, wise, and thrifty, And come of a right gentle kin; I'm little more than fifty." Daft carle, dit your mouth;

What signifies how pawky, Or gentle born ye be,-bot youth, In love you're but a gawky.

"Then, widow, let these guineas speak,

That powerfully plead clinkan, And if they fail, my mouth I'll steek, And nae mair love will think on." These court indeed, I maun confess, I think they make you young, sir, And ten times better can express Affection, than your tongue, sir.

THE LASS O' PATIE'S MILL.

THE lass o' Patie's Mill,

Sae bonnie, blythe, and gay,

In spite of a' my skill,

She stole my heart away. When teddin' out the hay,

Bareheaded on the green, Love mid her locks did play, And wanton'd in her een. Without the help of art,

Like flowers that grace the wild, She did her sweets impart,

Whene'er she spak' or smiled: Her looks they were so mild, Free from affected pride, She me to love beguiled:

I wish'd her for my bride.
Oh! had I a' the wealth
Hopetoun's high mountains fill,
Insured lang life and health,
And pleasure at my will;
I'd promise, and fulfill,

That nane but bonnie she,
The lass o' Patie's Mill,
Should share the same wi' me.

LADY GRIZZEL BAILLIE.

1665-1746.

IN the Ancient Section of Scottish Poems we have had only one female contribution; the Modern Section, in strict chronological order, should have begun with Lady Grizzel Baillie. Most of her songs, composed to lighten the intervals of more serious duties, she left unfinished, so that her claim to a place in Scottish literature rests mainly

on the very simple and touching ballad song, "Were na my heart light."

She was the daughter of Sir Patrick Home of Polwarth, afterwards created Earl of Marchmont, and was born at Redbraes Castle, on 25th December 1665. Her youth was passed in troublous times. She was but a young girl of eighteen, when the rigours of the Duke of York's

government in Scotland induced a number of Scottish gentlemen, among whom was her father, to enter into a secret engagement with the Earl of Monmouth, to prevent the Duke succeeding his brother Charles II. The Scottish section of the agreement was called the Jerviswood Plot, after Robert Baillie of Jerviswood, its chief agent. Its discovery was brought about through the miscarriage of the Ryehouse Plot, but Jerviswood alone suffered deaththe rest having made their escape in various ways.

Sir Patrick Home, before he managed to leave Scotland, made seve ral narrow escapes, and the efforts of his wife and daughter Grizzel, for his safety, while marked by the characteristic sternness of the times, and the strong kindred attachment of the people, were not without their humorous features. Being compelled to use the family vault at Polwarth Church as the only place of safe concealment, his food had to be brought him at night, and the task of doing so devolved on Grizzel, as one of the three who was entrusted with the secret of his hidingplace. To avoid suspicion, his food was taken from the family meals in the servants' absence, and one day while Grizzel was transferring to her lap a sheep's head, a dish which her father, like a true Scot, relished, a younger brother who had acquired the national relish, with a sense of his loss of what has been termed "a lot of confused good eating," bawled out, "Mamma, look at Grizzy-while we were supping the broth she has eaten up all the sheep's head." Sir Patrick good-naturedly

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She main'd and she graned out o' dolour and pain,

His bonnet stood aye fu' round on his brow;

Till he vow'd he never wad see me again. His auld ane look'd aye as weel as some's

His kin was for ane of a higher degree,
Said, What had he to do wi' the like of
me?

Albeit I was bonnie, I was na for Johnnie:
And were na my heart licht I wad dee.

They said I had neither cow nor calf,
Nor dribbles o' drink rins through the draff,
Nor pickles o' meal rins through the mill-
ee ;

And were na my heart licht I wad dee.

His titty she was baith wylie and slee,
She spied me as I cam' ower the lea;
And then she ran in, and made a loud din;
Believe your ain een an ye trow na me.

new;

But now he lets 't wear ony gate it will hing,

And casts himself dowie upon the cornbing.

And now he gaes daundrin' about the
dykes,

And a' he dow do is to hund the tykes:
The live-lang nicht he ne'er steeks his e'e;
And were na my heart licht I wad dee.

Were I young for thee, as I ha'e been,
We should ha'e been gallopin' doun on
yon green,

And linkin' it ower the lily-white lea;
And wow! gin I were but young for thee!

LADY WARDLAW.

1677-1727.

chronology.

"HARDYKNUTE," the ballad on which | irreconcilable with all Lady Wardlaw's poetic fame entirely depends, had long passed for a genuine ancient relic, and doubts are still entertained as to whether it may not have had some ancient nucleus. Whether the story of its being found as the paper centre of a worsted clue, be an ingenious symbol of its origin, or a witty invention, cannot now be determined; all that is certain is, that it was first published in 1719, by James Watson the well-known Edinburgh printer, and has since been reprinted in most collections of ballad poetry. It has been admired by Gray and Bishop Percy; and Scott says it was the first poem he learned, and the last he should forget, although

That a Norwegian chief, settled in Scotland, should be the first to resist the invasion of his countrymen at the battle of Largs, is not without parallel in history; but is so very improbable, that if it did happen, history or tradition would have made some allusion to it. But the inconsistency is only in the name, for in stanza xxi. Hardyknute (never before or since applied to a Celt) appeals to his sons' Caledonian blood.

Lady Wardlaw was born in 1677. She was the daughter of Sir Charles Halkett of Pitferran, and was married to Sir Henry Wardlaw of Pitreavie, in 1696. She died in 1727, at the age of fifty.

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