North. Better and better. I see, James, that Allan Cunningham' has included some of your lyrics in his late Collection of the Songs of Scotland. Shepherd. Oh, man! I wush you would lend me the wark. Is't a gude collekshon, d'ye opine? North. A very good collection, indeed, James. Allan is occasionally very happy in his ardent eulogy of his country's lyrical genius, and one loves to hear a man speaking about a species of poetry in which he has himself excelled. Shepherd. I'm thinkin you wad scarcely trust me wi' the reviewin o' Allan Kinnigam's wark-for you'll be for doin't yoursel-though I wad do't a hantle better, wi' mair nature and knowledge, too, if wi' fewer fine-spun theories. But you're gettin desperate conçated, and mair especially o' what you execute warst. North. Come, James, be less severe, and I will sing you one of Allan's songs. Shepherd. Huts, ye never sung a sang i' your life at least never that I heard tell o';-but to be sure you're a maist extraordinary cretur, and can do onything you hae a mind to try. North. My voice is rather cracked and tremulous—but I have sung Scotch airs, James, of old, with Urbani. MY AIN COUNTREE. The sun rises bright in France And fair sets he; But he has tint2 the blithe blink he had In my ain countree. O! gladness comes to many, But sorrow comes to me, As I look o'er the wide ocean O! it's not my ain ruin That saddens aye my ee, 1 Allan Cunningham died in October 1842. 2 Tint--lost. TO BED. The bud comes back to summer, Which will be leal to me; 205 Shepherd. Weel, I never heard the like o' that in a' my days. Deevil tak me gin there be sic a perfectly beautiful singer in a' Scotland. I prefer you to baith Peter Hill and David Wylie,' and twa bonnier singers you'll no easier hear in "house or ha' by coal or candle licht." But do you ken, I'm desperate sleepy. Tickler. Let's off to roost. North. Stop till I ring for candles. Shepherd. Cawnels! and sic a moon! It wad be perfect blasphemy-dounricht atheism. But hech, sirs, it's het, an' I'se sleep without the sark the nicht. North. Without a sark, James! "a mother-naked man!” Shepherd. I'm a bachelor ye ken, the noo, sae can tak my ain way o't-Gude nicht, sir-gude nicht-We've really been verra pleasant, and our meetin has been maist as agreeable as ane o' the NOCTES AMBROSIANÆ. 1 Peter Hill is spoken of in the "Chaldee MS." ch. i., v. 57, as "a sweet singer." David Wylie is one of the circuit clerks of the Court of Session. (OCTOBER 1826.) MR TICKLER'S smaller Dining-room-Southside. SHEPHERD, MR NORTH, MR TICKLER. Shepherd. We've just had a perfec denner, Mr Ticklerneither ae dish ower mony, nor ae dish ower few. Twa coorses is aneuch for ony Christian-and as for frute after fude, it's a dounricht abomination, and coagulates on the stamach like sour cruds. I aye like best to devoor frute in the forenoons, in gardens by mysel, daunering' at my leisure frae bush to bush, and frae tree to tree, pu'in awa at strawberries, or rasps, or grozets, or cherries, or aipples, or peers, or plooms, or aiblins at young green peas, shawps2 an' a', or wee juicy neeps, that melt in the mooth o' their ain accord without chewin, like kisses of vegetable maitter. Tickler. Do you never catch a tartar, James, in the shape o' a wasp, that Shepherd. Confound thae deevils incarnate, for they're the curse o' a het simmer. O' a' God's creturs, the wasp is the only ane that's eternally out o' temper. There's nae sic thing as pleasin him. In the gracious sunshine, when a' the bit bonny burdies are singing sae cantily, and stopping for half a minute at a time, noo and than, to set richt wi' their bills a feather that's got rumpled by sport or spray—when the bees are at wark, murmurin in their gauzy flight, although no gauze, indeed, be comparable to the filaments o' their woven wings, or clinging silently to the flowers, sook, sookin out the hinny-dew, till their verra doups dirl wi' delight1 Daunering-sauntering. 2 Shawps-husks. WASPS. SHEPHERD'S DREAM OF BEING HANGED. 207 when a' the flees that are ephemeral, and weel contented wi' the licht and the heat o' ae single sun, keep dancin in their burnished beauty, up and down, and to and fro, and backwards and forwards, and sideways, in millions upon millions, and yet ane never joistling anither, but a' harmoniously blended together in amity, like imagination's thochts,—why, amid this "general dance and minstrelsy," in comes a shower o' infuriated wasps, red het, as if let out o' a fiery furnace, pickin quarrels wi' their ain shadows-then roun' and roun' the hair o' your head, bizzin against the drum o' your ear, till you think they are in at the ae hole and out at the itherback again, after makin a circuit, as if they had repentit o' lettin you be unharmed, dashing against the face o' you who are wishin ill to nae leevin thing, and, although you are engaged out to dinner, stickin a lang poishoned stang in just below your ee, that, afore you can rin hame frae the garden, swalls up to a fearsome hicht, making you on that side look like a Blackamoor, and on the opposite white as death, sae intolerable is the agony frae the tail of the yellow imp, that, according to his bulk, is stronger far than the Dragon o' the Desert. Tickler. I detest the devils most, James, when I get them into my mouth. Before you can spit them out the evil is done-your tongue the size of that of a rein-deer-or your gullet, once wide as the Gut of Gibraltar, clogged up like a canal in the neighbourhood of a railroad. Shepherd. As for speaking in sic a condition, everybody but yoursel kens it's impossible, and wunner to hear ye tryin't. But you'll no be perswauded, and attempt talking -every motion o' the muscles bein' as bad as a convulsion o' hydrophobia, and the best soun' ye can utter waur than ony bark, something atween a grunt, a growl, and a guller, like the skraich o' a man lyin on his back, and dreamin that he's gaun to be hanged. Tickler. My dear James, I hope you have had that dream? What a luxury! Shepherd. There's nae medium in my dreams, sir—heaven or hell's the word. But oh! that hanging! It's the warst job o' a', and gars my very sowl sicken wi' horror for sake o' the puir deevils that's really hanged out and out, bonâ fide, wi' a tangible tow, and a hangman that's mair than a mere apparition, a pardoned felon wi' creeshy second-hand corduroy 208 SHEPHERD'S DREAM OF BEING BEHEADED. breeks, and coat short at the cuffs, sae that his thick hairy wrists are visible when he's adjustin the halter, hair red red, yet no sae red as his bleared een, glarin wi' an unaccountable fairceness, for Lord hae mercy upon us, can man o' woman born, think ye, be fairce on a brither, when handlin his wizen1 às executioner, and hearin, although he was deaf, the knockin o' his distracted heart that wadna break for a' its meesery, but like a watch stoppin when it gets a fa' on the stanes, in ae minute lies quate, when down wi' a rummle gangs the platform o' the scaffold, and the soul o' the son o' sin and sorrow is instantly in presence of its eternal Judge! North. Pleasant subject-matter for conversation after dinner, gentlemen. In my opinion, hangin Shepherd. Haud your tongue about hangin: It's discussed. Gin you've got onything to say about beheadin, let's hear you-for I've dreamt o' that too, but it was a mere flee-bite to the other mode o' execution. Last time I was beheaded, it was for a great National Conspiracy, found out just when the mine was gaun to explode, and blaw up the King on his throne, the constitution, as it was ca'd, and the kirk. Do ye want to hear about it? North. Proceed, you rebel. Shepherd. A' the city sent out its population into ae michty square, and in the midst thereof was a scaffold forty feet high, a' hung wi' black cloth, and open to a' the airts. A block like a great anvil, only made o' wood instead o' airn, was in the centre o' the platform, and there stood the Headsman wi' a mask on, for he was frichtened I wad see his face, sax feet high and some inches, wi' an axe ower his shouther, and his twa naked arms o' a fearsome thickness, a' crawlin wi' sinews, like a yard o' cable to the sheet-anchor o' a man-o'war. A hairy fur-cap towered aboon his broos, and there were neither shoes nor stockings on his braid splay feet, juist as if he were gaun to dance on the boards. But he never mudged-only I saw his een rollin through the vizor, and they were baith bloodshot. He gied a gruesome cough, or something not unlike a lauch, that made ice o' my bluid; and at that verra minute, hands were laid on me, I kentna by whom or whither, and shears began clipping my hair, and fingers like leeches creeped about my neck, and then without 1 Wizen-the throat. 2 Airts-points of the compass, |