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15

SCOTCH SONGS AND BALLADS

WILLIAM AND MARGARET

(Claimed by David Mallet [Malloch])

"TWAS at the silent solemn hour,
When night and morning meet;
In glided Margaret's grimly ghost,

And stood at William's feet.

Her face was like an April morn
Clad in a wintry cloud;
And clay-cold was her lily hand

That held her sable shroud.

So shall the fairest face appear,
When youth and years are flown:
Such is the robe that kings must wear,
When death has reft their crown.

Her bloom was like the springing flower,
That sips the silver dew;

The rose was budded in her cheek,
Just opening to the view.

But love had, like the canker-worm,
Consumed her early prime;

The rose grew pale, and left her cheek,
She died before her time.

'Awake!' she cried, 'thy true love calls,
Come from her midnight grave:

Now let thy pity hear the maid
Thy love refused to save.

"This is the dark and dreary hour

When injured ghosts complain;

When yawning graves give up their dead,
To haunt the faithless swain.

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25

'Bethink thee, William, of thy fault,

Why did you swear my eyes were bright,
Yet leave those eyes to weep?

35

'How could you say my face was fair,

And yet that face forsake?

How could you win my virgin heart,

Yet leave that heart to break?

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45

'Why did you say my lip was sweet,
And made the scarlet pale?

And why did I, young, witless maid!
Believe the flattering tale?

"That face, alas! no more is fair,

Those lips no longer red:

Dark are my eyes, now closed in death,
And every charm is fled.

'The hungry worm my sister is;

This winding-sheet I wear:

And cold and weary lasts our night,

Till that last morn appear.

'But hark! the cock has warned me hence;

A long and last adieu!

Come see, false man, how low she lies,

Who died for love of you.'

The lark sung loud; the morning smiled
With beams of rosy red:

Pale William quaked in every limb,

And raving left his bed.

He hied him to the fatal place

Where Margaret's body lay;

And stretched him on the green-grass turf

That wrapt her breathless clay.

THE smiling morn, the breathing spring,
Invite the tuneful birds to sing;
And, while they warble from the spray,
Love melts the universal lay.

Let us, Amanda, timely wise,

Like them, improve the hour that flies;
And in soft raptures waste the day,
Among the birks of Invermay.

For soon the winter of the year,
And age, life's winter, will appear;

At this thy living bloom will fade,
As that will strip the verdant shade.
Our taste of pleasure then is o'er,
The feathered songsters are no more;
And when they drop and we decay,
Adieu the birks of Invermay!

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15

WILLIAM HAMILTON

THE BRAES OF YARROW

A. BUSK ye, busk ye, my bonnie, bonnie bride;
Busk ye, busk ye, my winsome marrow!
Busk ye, busk ye, my bonnie, bonnie bride,

And think nae mair on the Braes of Yarrow.

5 B. Where gat ye that bonnie, bonnie bride? Where gat ye that winsome marrow? A. I gat her where I darena weil be seen,

Pu'ing the birks on the Braes of Yarrow.

Weep not, weep not, my bonnie, bonnie bride;
Weep not, weep not, my winsome marrow !
Nor let thy heart lament to leive

Pu'ing the birks on the Braes of Yarrow.

B. Why does she weep, thy bonnie, bonnie bride? Why does she weep, thy winsome marrow? And why dare ye nae mair weil be seen,

Pu'ing the birks on the Braes of Yarrow?

A. Lang maun she weep, lang maun she, maun she

weep,

Lang maun she weep with dule and sorrow,