Annotations of Scottish songs by Burns: an essential supplement to Cromek and Dick

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LOS ANGELES

ANNOTATIONS OF SCOTTISH
SONGS BY BURNS :

An Essential Supplement to Cromek and Dick.

BY

DAVIDSON COOK, F.S.A. (Scot.)

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ANNOTATIONS OF SCOTTISH
SONGS BY BURNS :

An Essential Supplement to Cromek and Dick.

BY

DAVIDSON COOK, F.S.A. (Scot).

Illustrated by the First Published Facsimile from the famous Interleaved Copy

of The Scots Musical Museum, and a Portrait (probably the first published) of

Robert Riddell of Glenriddell, for whom the specially prepared volumes of

Johnson's work were annotated by its chief contributor, Robert Burns.

FIFTY COPIES.
Reprinted for the Author from the "Annual Burns Chronicle," 1922.

DUMFRIES

ROBERT DINWIDDIE, Printer. &c , High Street.

1922.

Digitized by tine Internet Arciiive

in 2008 witii funding from

IVIicrosoft Corporation

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ANNOTATIONS OF SCOTTISH SONGS BY
BURNS :

Ax Essential Supplement to Ckomek and Dick,

In which, on the authority of an important Burns Manuscript now
in the Edinburgh University Library, many Notes lately deemed
" Spurious " and " Garbled," are restored to textual currency as
authentic emanations of the Poet's song-lore.

WHEN R. H. Cromek, in his Reliques of Robert Burns,
180S, included the writings of the Bard as a song
annotator, he prefaced them thus : —

" The chief part of the following Remarks on Scottish
Songs and Ballads exist in the handwriting of Robert
Burns, in an interleaved copy, in four volumes octavo, of
Johnson's Scots Musical Museum. They were \^Titten
by the Poet for Captain Riddel of Glenriddel, whose auto-
graph the volumes bear. These valuable volumes were
left by Mrs Riddel to her niece, Miss Eliza Bayley, of Man-
chester, by whose kindness the Editor is enabled to give
to the public transcripts of this amusing and miscellaneous
collection."

For years, editor after editor, in edition after edition,
copied the " Strictures on Scottish Songs," as printed by
Cromek ; for the whereabouts of the Interleaved Volume
being unknown to them, they had perforce to lean upon
the Reliques. An American edition of that work appeared
in 1809, and the following year Cromek published, in two
volumes, his Select Scotish Songs. This is how he begins
his preface : — " The following Remarks from the pen of
Burns appeared in the publication of the Reliques." That
statement is a bit wide of the truth. The " Remarks "

48621*7 .

in many cases do not follow the order of their first publi-
cation, thus making comparison awkward, but persistent
collation shews that though Stenhouse and other authorities

Robert Riddell of Glenriddell,

Fi-om a Frontispiece Drawing in one of his Manuscript Volumes now in tlie Library

of the Society of Antiquaries, London, to whose courtesy we are indebted for this,

probably the first publislied, portrait of the friend of the Poet.

cite the Reliques of 1808 in quoting a comment by Burns
on " The boatie rows," that note, and twenty-one others
printed in the 1810 volumes, did 7iol appear in the Reliques ;

and of those which did make their debut in that work,
two are omitted in Select Scofish Songs.

At long last J. C. Dick, the scholarly editor of that
invaluable volume, The Songs of Robert Burns, 1903, got
access to the veritable Interleaved Copy of The Scots
Musical Museum — a book so enriched by Burns that when
it passed through Sotheby's it fetched £610. It is now
in the collection of Dr John Gribbel, of Philadelphia, to
whose splendid generosity Scotland owes its possession
of two other treasure-books which link the names of Burns
and Glenriddell for ever with his own.

The results of Mr Dick's careful scrutiny of the Inter-
leaves appeared in a volume — of which only 255 copies
were printed — published posthumously in 1908, exactly
a hundred years after The Reliques of Robert Burns. Dick's
book (another splendid contribution to real Burns literature)
is entitled Notes on Scottish Song by Robert Burns, &c. In
it he dissects Cromek"s Reliques version of Burns's " Stric-
tures," and sets forth (1) the Notes found in the actual
handwriting of Burns ; (2) Notes written by Riddell and
interspersed among those in the Poet's holograph, all of
which (Riddell's) had for a century been accounted the
legitimate prose offsjDring of Burns ; (3) Notes which
could not be verified, as the Interleaves, where presumably
Cromek found them, have been abstracted from the volume.
It would be a great find if they could be located, especially
that leaf with the note on Highland Mary. Dick, in
further introducing his volume, says : " The last part
(4) consists of a series of Spurious Notes, also printed by
Cromek in the Reliques. These are not in the (Glenriddell)
volumes, and never were there." Referring to Cromek's
ISIO additions, he says : "All the additions were written
either by himself or by his friend in deception Allan
Cunningham."

Mr Dick branded fifteen Notes as " Spurious," and
others, he says in his Appendix, " Cromek has garbled."

By a lucky chance a friend sent me three cuttings from
the Kilmarnock Standard (v.d. May, 1921) of an article

6

written by Mr David Cuthbertson, Sub-Librarian of Edin-
burgh University, the subject being " Manuscripts of Robert
Burns : The property of Edinburgh University." It
was an interesting article all through, but the parts which
made me open my eyes wide were certain quotations of
Song Annotations by Burns, taken from " a separate manu-
script written on Excise paper, and consisting of twelve
folio pages," entirely in the handwriting of the Poet.

To my amazement, I found that the passages cited
were, word for word, the same as some of the Notes classified
as " spurious " by Mr Dick. This appeared very significant,
and seemed to indicate that while, as Cromek says — and
there is great virtue in his phraseology- — "' the chief part "
of the Notes printed in his Reliques of Robert Burns were,
as stated, from the Interleaved copy of the Scots Musical
Museum, he had also drawn upon at least one other unstated
source — this very Burns Manuscript of twelve folio pages,
which is one of the Laing MSS. now treasured in the Library
of Edinburgh University.

The correctness of this deduction was amply confirmed
by a verbatim transcript of this most important and
illuminative manuscript, obligingly and with helpful
courtesy furnished bj^ Mr Frank C. Nicholson, M.A., Chief
Librarian of the University, whose great kindness and
generous permission to make the fullest use thereof for the
information of students of Burns literature has made this
article possible. For purposes of reference the Editor
was strongly of opinion that the manuscript should be
printed in full in the Annual Burns Chronicle, and I had
no hesitation in placing it at his disposal.

Transcript of a Burns Manuscript of 12 Folio P.\ges in
Edinburgh University Library.

(p. 1) : Wauhin o' the Fauld. — There are two stanzas still
sung to this tune, which I take to be the original song when Ramsay
composed his beautiful song of that name in the " Gentle Shepherd."
It begins : —

O will ye speak ar our town,
As ye come frae the fauld. <fcc.

I regret that, as in many of our old songs, the delicacy of this old
fragment is not equal to its wit and hvunor.

Maggie Lauder.

Mill, Mill, O. — The original, or at least a song evidently
prior to Ramsay's, is still extant. It begins : —

As I cam down yon waterside.

And by yon shillin-hill, O,
There I spied a bonie, bonie lass.

And a lass that 1 lo'ed right weel, O.

Chorus —

The mill, mill, O, and the kill, kill. O,
And the coggin o' Peggy's wheel, O,

The sack and the sieve, and a' she did leave,
And danc'd the Miller's reel, O.

The remainmg two stanzas, though pretty enoagh, partake
rather too much of the rude simplicity of the " olden time " to be
admitted here.

(p. 2) : Boh o' Dumblane. — Ramsay, as usual, has modernised
The original, which I learned on the spot, from my

this song. The original, which j
Hostess in the principal Inn there

Lassie, lend me your braw hemp heckle,

And I'll lend yoii my thripplin-kame ;
My heckle is broken, it canna be gotten.

And we'll gae dance the boh o' Diunblane.

Twa gaed to the wood, to the wood, to the wood,
Twa gaed to the wood — three came hame :

An' it be na weel bobbit, weel bobbit, weel bobbit,
An' it be na weel bobbit, we'll bob it again.

1 insert this song to introduce the following anecdote which I
have heard well authenticated. In the evening of the day of the

8

battle of Dumblane (SheritTmooi), after the action was over, a Scots
officer in Argjde's army observed to His Grace that he was afraid
the rebels would give out to the world that they had gotten the
victory. " Weel, weel," retiirned His Grace, alluding to the fore-
going ballad ; "if they think it be na weel bobbit, we'll bob it
again."

O^cr the Mmr ainatvj llw Heather. —

0, vow ! an' I had her.
O'er the muir, amang the heather,
A' her friends should na get her
Till I made her lo'e me better.

The Moudiewort.

(p. 3) : Kirk wad let me he. — Tradition in the Western parts
of Scotland tells this old song, of which there are still three stanzas
extant, once saved a Covenanting Clergyman out of a scrape. It
was a little prior to the Revolution, a period when being a Scots
Covenanter was being a Felon, one of their clergy who was at that
very time hunted by the merciless soldiery, fell in, by accident, with
a party of the militarj-. The soldiers were not exactly acquainted
with the person of the Rev. gentleman of whom they were in search ;
but from some suspicioiis circumstances they fancied that they had
got one of that cloth and opjjrobious persuasion among them in
the person of this stranger. " Mass John," to extricate hinaself,
assiuned such a freedom of manners (verj' unlike the gloomy strict-
ness of his sect), and among other convivial exhibitions, sung (and,
some traditions say, composed on the spur of the occasion) " Kirk
wad let me be," with such effect, that the soldiers swore he was a

4 d honest fellow, and that it was impossible he could belong

to these hellish conventicles, and so gave him his liberty.

The first stanza of this song, a little altered, is a favourite kind
of di-amatic interlude at country weddmgs in the south-west parts
of the kingdom. A young fellow is dressed uji like an old beggar ;
a peruke, commonly of carded tow, to represent hoary locks ; an
old bonnet ; a ragged plaid, or surtout, bound with a straws-rope
for a girdle ; a pair of old shoes, with straw-ropes twisted round
his ancles, as is done by shepherds in snowy weather (p. 4) ; his face
disguised as like wretched old age as they can. In this plight he

is brought into the wedding house, frequently to the astonishment
of strangers who are not in the secret, and begins to sing : —

O, I am a silly auld nian.

My name it is auld Glenae.* dhc.

He is asked to drink, and by and by to dance, which, after
some uncouth excuses, he is prevailed on to do, the fiddler playiiig the
tune, which here is commonly called " Auld Glenae "; in short,
he is all the time so plied with liquor that he is understood to be
intoxicated, and with all the ridicvilous gesticulations of an old drunken
beggar, he dances and stagg(ers) untill he falls on the floor, yet
still in all his ri(ot), nay in his rolling and tiunbling on the floor,
with some or other drunken motion of his body, he beats time to
the music, till at last he is supposed to be carried out dead-drunk.

(p. 5) : Wat ye what my Minnie did ?

Wat ye what my minnie did,
My minnie did, my minnie did,
An' wat ye what my minnie did,
My minnie did to me, jo ?

She put me in a dark room,
A dark room, a dark room.
She put me in a dark room,

A stjane I could na see, jo.

And there came in a lang man,
A meikle man, a Strang man.
And there came in a lang man.

He might hae worried me ! jo. dec.

If ever I marry, Vll marry a wri>jht.—(iiee this tune in Oswald).

If ever I marry, I'll marry a wright.

He'll set up my bed, and he'll set it up right. <fcc.

* Glenae, on the small river Ae, in Annandale ; the seat and
designation of an ancient branch, and the present representative
of the gallant, but unfortunate, Dalziels of Carnwath.

10

Lass, an' I come near ye. — (See this tune in Aird's " Selec-
tion of Airs and Marches.")

Lass, an' I come near ye.
Lass, an' I come near ye,
I'll gar a' your ribbands reel
Lass, an' I come near ye !

Little 'wats thou o' thy daddie, hiney. — (Sometimes called
Elsie Marley,) —

O little wats thou o' thy daddie, hiney,
An' little wats thou o' thy daddie, hiney ;
For lairds and lords hae kiss'd thy minnie,
An' little wats thou o' thy daddie, hiney.

(p. 0) : The King o' France he rade a race. — (Oswald &
Macgibbon's Collections, now altered into a modern reel called
The lass o' Loncarty)—

The King o' France he rade a race

Out o'er the hills o' Syria,
His eldest {sic) has followed him,

Upon a gude grey marie, O ;
They were sae high, they were sae skeigh,

Naebody durst come near them, O ;
But there cam a Fiddler out o' Fife

That dang them tapsalteerie, O,

Rob shoor in hairst. — (See this tune in Oswald's and other
Collections.) —

O Robin shoor in hairst,

I shoor wi' him ;
Fient a heuk had I,

Yet I stack by him. due.

Jackie's gray breeks. — Though this has certainly every evidence
of being a Scotish air, yet there is a well-known tune and song in
the North of Ireland, call'd " The weaver and his shuttle, O," which
though sung much quicker, is, every note, the very tune.

11

Corn rigs are bonie. — All that ever I could meet of old words
to this air were the following, which seems to have been an old
chorus : —

O corn-rigs and rye-rigs,
O corn-rigs are bonie,
And where'er ye meet a bonie lass.
Preen up her cockernony.

The Posie. — It appears evident to me that Oswald composed
his " Roslin Castle" on the modulation of this air. In the second
part of Oswald's, in the three first (p. 7) bars, he has either hit on a
wonderful similarity to, or else he has entirely borrowed the three
first bars of the older air ; and the close of both times is almost
exactlj- the same. The old verses to which it was simg, when I
took down the notes from a country girl's voice, had no great merit.
The following is a specimen : —

There was a pretty May, and a-milkin' she went,
Wi' her red, rosy cheeks and her coal-black hair :
And she has met a young man a-comin' o'er the bent ;
With a double and adieu to thee fair May.

O whare are ye goin', my ain pretty May,
Wi' thy red, rosy cheeks and thy coal-black hair ;
Unto the yowes a-milkin', kind Sir, she saj's,
With a double and adieu to thee fair May.

What if 1 gang alang wi' tliee, my ain pretty May,
Wi' thy red, rosy cheeks and thy coal black hair ;
Wad I bo ought the warre o' that, kind Sir, she says.
With a double and adieu to thee fair May. (be.

Saw ye nae my Peggy. — The original words, for thej' can
scarcely be called verses, seem to be as follows, a song famiiiar
from the cradle to every Scotish ear : —

Saw ye my Maggie,
Saw ye mj' Maggie,
Saw ye my Maggie,

Linkin' o'er the lea ?

High kilted was she.
High kilted was she.
High kilted was she.

Her (coa)ts aboon her knee.

12

(p. 8) : What mark has your Maggie,

What mark has your Maggie,
W^hat mark has your Maggie,
That ane may ken her be ? {by), dec.

Though it by no means follows that the silliest verses to an
air must, for that reason, be the original song, yet I take this ballad,
of M-hich I have quoted part, to be the old verses.

The two songs in Ramsay, one of theni evidently his own, are
never to be met with in the fireside circle of oxir jieasantry ; \\'hile,
M-hat 1 take to be the old song is in every shepherd's mouth. Ramsay,
I suppose, had thought the old verses imworthy of a place in his
Collection.

Fy, gar rub her o^er wi' strae. — It is self-evident that the fu-st
four lines are part of a song much ancienter than Ramsay's beautiful
^■erses which are annexed to them. To this day, among people
who know nothing of Ramsay's verse, the following is the song,
and all the song that ever I heard : —

Gin ye meet a bonie lassie,

Gie her a kiss and let her gae ;
But gin ye meet a dirty hizzie,

Fye, gae rub her o'er wi' strae.

Fye, gae rub her, rub her, rub her,

Fye, gae rub her o'er wi' strae ;
An' gm ye meet a dirty hizzie,

Fye, gae rub her o'er wi' strae.

(j). 9) : The Lass o' Liviston. — The old song, in three eight-
line stanzas, is well known, and has merit as to wit and humour ;
but is rather mifit for insertion. It begins : —

The bonie lass o' Liviston,

Her nanie ye ken, her name ye ken.

And she has written in her contract.
To lie her lane, to lie her lane. etc.

The lass o' Patie's Mill. — In the Statistical Account of Scot-
land this song has been claimed by a Clergynian in Shire as belonging
to a place in Ayrshire and his parish, and Ijy the Clergyman of
G^lston as belonging to that countiy. The following is the fact :
Allan Ramsay was residing with the then Earl of Loudon at Loudon

13

Castle for some little time ; and one day Mr Ramsay, accompanying
his Lordship in a forenoon's walk or ride, at a place still known by
the name of Patie's Mill, on the banks of the Irvine, they saw a
pretty girl " Tedding o' the hay, Bareheaded on the green." My
Lord observed to Allan that she would Ije a charming subject for
a song. Ramsay took the hint ; and loitering behind, on their
return home, he set about the composition ; and at dinner produced
the first copy of The lass o' Patie's Mill.

This anecdote I had of my much-esteemed friend Sir William
Cunningham of Robertland, who had it of the late John, Earl of
Loudon.

(p. 10) : Highland Laddie. — As this Mas a favourite theme
with our later Scotish muses, there are several airs and songs of
that name. That which I take to be the oldest is to be found in
the Musical Museum, beginning " I hae been at Crookie-den."
One reason for my thinking so is, that Oswald has it in his collection
by the name of " The auld Highland laddie." It is also known
by the name of " Jinglan Johnie," which is a well-known song of
four or five stanzas, and seems to be an earlier song than Jacobite
times. As a proof of this, it is little known to the peasantry by
the name of " Highland Laddie "; while every bodj; knows " Jinglan
Johnie." The song begins :—

Jinglan John, the meikle man,

He met wi' a lass was blythe and Ijonie.

Another " Highland Laddie " is also in the Museum, vol. V.,
which I take to be Ramsay's original, as he has borrowed the chorus :
" O, my bonie Highland lad," &c. It consists of three stanzas,
besides the chorus ; and has hvimour in its composition. It begins : —

As I cam' o'er Cairney-Motmt,

And down amang the blooming heather. «&c.

This air and tlie common " Highland Laddie " seem only to
be different sets.

Another " Highland Laddie," also in the Mvscum, vol. V., is
the tune of several Jacobite fragments. One of these old songs
to it, only exists, as far as I know, in these four lines : —

Whare hae ye l)een a' day,

Bonie laddie. Highland Jaddie ?
Down the back o' Bell's brae,

Courtin' Maggie, courtin' Maggie.

Another of this name is Dr Arno's beautiful aii, called "The
new Highland Laddie."

14

(p. 11) : Clout the Caldron. — A tradition is mentioned in
The Bee, that the second Bishop Chisholm, of Dmiblane, used to
say, that if he were going to be hanged, nothing would soothe his
mind so much by the way as to hear " Clout the Cauldron " played.
I have met with another tradition, that the old song to this
tune —

" Hae ye ony pots or pans,
Or onie broken chanlers ?" —

was composed on one of the Kenmure family, in the Cavalier times ;
and alluded to an amour he had, while imder hiding, in the disguise
of an itinerant tinker. The air is also known by the name of —

'■ The Blacksmith and his Apron,"

which, from the rhythm, seems to have been a line of some old song
to the tune.

Aidd Lang Syne. — Ramsay here, as usual with him, has
taken the idea of the song, and the first line, from the old fragment,
which may be seen in the Museum, vol. V.

Dainty Davie. — This song, tradition says, and the composition
itself confirms it, was composed on the Rev. David Williamson's
begetting the daughter of Lady Cherrytrees with child, while a
party of dragoons were searching her hoiise to apprehend him for
being an adherent to the Solemn League and Covenant. The pious
woman had put a lady's night-cap on him, and had laid hun a-bed
with her own daughter, and passed him to the soldiery as a lady,
her daughter's bed-fellow. A mutilated stanza or two are to be
found in Herd's Collection, but the song consists of five or six stanzas,
and has merit in its way. The first stanza is : —

Being pursued by the dragoons.

Within my bed he was laid down ;

And weel I wat he was worth his room.
For he was my daintie Davie.

Ramsaj^'s song, " Luckie Nansie," though he calls it an old
song with additions, seems to be all his own, except the chorvis : —
I was ay tellmg you,

Luckie Nansie, luckie Nansie,

Auld springs wad ding the new.

But ye wad never trow me—

which I should conjecture to be part of a song prior to the affair
of Williamson.

15

(p. 12) : Tweedside. — I have seen a song calling itself the
original " Tweedside," and said to have been composed by a Lord
Yester. It consisted of two stanzas, of which I still recollect the

first : —

When Maggy and I was acqviaint,

I carried ma noddle fu' hie ;
Nae lintwhite on a' the green plain.

Nor gowspink sae happy as me :
But I saw her sae fair, and 1 lo'ed ;

I woo'd, but I came nae great speed ;
So now I maun wander abroad.

And lay my banes far frae the Tweed

ELUCIDATIONS.

j^ote. — When J. C. Dick's work is cited it shoukl be under-
stood that, unless otherwise stated, the reference is
to his Notes on Scottish Song by Robert Burns, 1908.

MS. Item 1 : " Waukin o' the Fauld."— This note
is in Croraek's Reliques, 1808, 232. Dick prints it (p. 77)
as a Spurious Note. According to the manuscript, the
word " tvhence " of the printed version should be " when.'''

Item 2 : " Maggie Lauder." — Only the title is ^vritten
on the manuscript. There is no notice of " Maggie Lauder "
in the Reliques, but in Select Scotish Songs, 1810, I., 93,
Cromek has a note thereon which, be it marked, follows
immediately after the one on " The Waukin o' the Faulds."
It reads : " This old song, so pregnant with Scottish
naiviete and energy, is much relished by all ranks, notwith-
standing its broad wit and palpable allusions. — Its
language is a precious model of imitation : sly, sprightly,
and forcibly expressive. — Maggie's tongue wags out
the nicknames of Rob the Piper with all the careless
lightsomeness of unrestrained gaiety."

Item 3 : " Mill, Mill, 0."— This is in the Reliques,
p. 244, with chorus and verse in reverse order, and the last

16

sentence printed in smaller type as a footnote. Cromek
must have forgotten that the words so treated were in the
manuscript, for in reprinting them in his Select Scotish
Songs (vol. I., 133) he appropriates the footnote by adding
" Ed." No doubt that explains why Mr Dick, in classing
the item with his " Spurious Notes " (p. 77), omitted the
sentence entirely. There is one slight verbal discrepancy
in the printed versions. For " It begins — " in the manu-
script, Cromek printed " It ru7is thus : — "

Item 4 : " Bob o' Dumblane." — This interesting anec-
dote, reminiscent of the Poet's Highland Tour, with its
glimpse of his work as a gleaner of traditional song, will
be welcomed back to the canon of his authentic writings.
It was printed in the Reliques, p. 305, and numbered among
Dick's " Spurious Notes " (p. 80). The manuscript and
printed renderings agree, with the slight exception that
the " is " printed immediately before the poetry is evidently
an interpolation.

Item 5 : " O'er the Muir amang the Heather.'' — Here
the manuscript yields an interesting little discovery. Burns
wrote in the interleaved Museum a spicy note [Reliques,
p. 296) on the song of this title, in which he ascribed it to
an erring daughter of Killie called Jean Glover. Dick's
comment (p. 109) is : " Except for what Burns has said
on this beautiful song, absolutely nothing else is known,
except that the tune, with the title, is in Bremner's Reels,
1760, at the time when Jean Glover, the assumed writer
of the song, was only two years of age. Therefore, a
song of some sort existed in 1760, of which there is now no
trace. I have long thought that Burns himself did much
more than edit this fine song."

The verse in the manuscript is quite different from
any in the song as published in the fourth volume of the
Scots Musical Mtiseum (1792), and in all likelihood we
have here an otherwise unrecorded fragment of the old
song, as sung by the strolling singer. Thanks to Mr
Frank Kidson, of Leeds, I am able to supplement Mr Dick's

17

information about the tune. It is in Thompson's Country
Dances for 1758 as '" In the moor among the heather,"
probably j)ublished in the autumn of 1757, and exactly
the same set is in the Universal Magazine for March, 1758.

Item G : " The Moudieworl.'' — The title only is noted
on the manuscript. It is the tune for " O, for ane-and-
twenty. Tarn,"' which, though not dealt with in the Beliques,
is printed in Select Scotish Songs, 1810, II., 171, prefixed
with the remark : " This song is mine."

Item 7 : " Kirk icad let me 6e." — This very long and
rather interesting note (Reliques, 252), branded as spurious
by Mr Dick (p. 78), was printed by Cromek with the words
appended to the footnote : " This is the Author's note."
Mr Dick had abundant grounds for scepticism, and no
one could blame him for applying his literary branding-
iron, but with all his faults as an editor, and they were many,
the Edinburgh University Manuscript proved that Cromek
was right, and that note and footnote are alike genuine
Burns.

Item 8: " Wat ye what my Minnie did f — Cromek
seems to have made no use of these lineS; which do not
appear in either of his works.

Item 9 : " // ever I marry, Pll marry a wright." —
Another fragment of song not used by Cromek when he
handled the manuscript.

Item 10 : " Lass, and I come near ye.'' — Cromek Hkc-
wise ignored this little Note and snatch of song, probably
because he printed, as if it were by Burns, one of Eiddell's
notes relating to " Wha is that at my bower-door?" and
the same tune, inferentially signing Burns's name to it
by the unauthorised addition of the formula, " The words
are mine" (see Reliques, 301). The air mentioned is,
as Burns says, in Aird's work. It is in the first book,
which Mr Dick dates 1782, l)ut which Mr Frank Kidson,
an even greater authority on Antiquarian Music, says he
has good proof was earlier — about 1775-6.

18

Item 11 : " Little wats fJiou o' thy Daddie, hiney." —
This is another scrap of song not noted by Cromek. The
tune, " Elsie Marley," is in" Bremner's Reels, 1759, and
in later Collections, including Gow's Fourth Repository.

Item 12 : " The King o' France he rade a race." — This
hitherto unpubhshed Note has a special interest, because
it unexpectedly furnishes us with a verse of the old song
which Burns used as a model for " Amang the trees where
humming bees," published in Cromek's Reliques, 1808, p.
453, to the tune, " The King of France he rade a race."
In his last two lines —

He flr'd a fiddler in the Nortli

That dang them tapsalteerie, O,

it will be seen how closely Burns followed the original, and
taking the verse as a whole, how little he was indebted to it.

Item 13 : " Rob shoor in hairst.'^ — Ignored by Cromek.

Item 14 : " Jockie's gray breeks." — Printed in the
Reliques, p. 205, with the word " certain " of the manu-
script altered to " ceftainZ?/." Dick includes it among
the " Spurious Notes " (p. 75), but there cannot now be
any doubt of its authenticity, even though the original is
not in the interleaved Museum.

Item 15 : " Gor7i rigs are bonie.'' — The note given by
Cromek {Reliques, p. 231), though shghtly varied in sequence
of words, is manifestly copied from the Edinburgh Uni-
versity Manuscript. A somewhat similar note in the
interleaved Museum (Dick, p. 22) reads : " There must
have been an old song under this title ; the chorus of it is
all that remains ''• —

O corn-rigs and rye-rigs,
O corn-rigs are bonie,
And where'er ye meet a bonie lass,
Preen up her cockernonj".

Mr Dick seems, in this instance, to have overlooked the
discrepancy between the Reliques version and the Burns
holograph in the interleaved Museum.

19

Item 16 : " The Posie." — This is the undoubted original
of the note in Cromek's Reliques (p. 214) which Dick —
failing to find in the interleaved copy of the Scots Musical
Museum, and quite evidently unsuspicious of any other
authentic manuscript source — printed in his volume (p.
76) among the " Spurious Notes."

Item 17 : " Saio ye nae my Peggy .?" — In Dick's
Appendix (p. 83), he says : " Cromek has a long note in
his Reliques which is not in the manuscript." Nevertheless
it is no " invention " of Cromek, who, with two annotations
of the song in Burns's handwriting in front of him — as
we now for the first time know — in this case printed what
he found in the Glenriddell volume, and eked it out with
the longer note from the Excise Paper Manuscript of twelve
folio pages.

Item 18 : " Fy, gar rub her o'er wi sirae.^' — Dick says
(p. 84) " Cromek reconstructed and made additions to
this note." In a sense that is very true. The note as
printed in the Reliques (p. 202), is the whole of that in the
Excise Paper MS., with the interleaved Museum note —
minus the first sentence — sandwiched into it. It is peculiar
editing, but it is all genuine Burns lore.

Item 19 : " The lass o' LivistonJ' — Dick's observation
is : " Here again Cromek has garbled the note. The
part of the old song which he quotes incorrectly is . . .
in the Merry Muses'' What Cromek did do was to give
preference to his alternative manuscript, his indebtedness
to which — Avith a laxity too common in his time — he did
not even trouble to mention. He followed it faithfully
however [Reliques, 204), and the verse also, though not
agreeing with the rendering in the Merry Muses, is as
Burns penned it in the manuscript under review.

Item 20 : " The lass o' Patie's Mill."— This note is
very similar, but not quite identical with the one in the
Interleaved Glenriddell Volume, which Cromek printed
in his Reliques, p. 205.

20

Item 30 : " Highland L(7rff/?>."— Referring to this
note, as given in tlu> Reliqves (p. 207), Mr Dick, in his special
summing up of the " Spurious Notes " (p. 123), remarks :
" ' Highland Laddie ' is a long comjiosite invention, super-
seding the short note which Burns wTote." We know now
that it was no " invention," but a genuine Burns com-
mentary which Cromek selected from his Manuscript No. 2,
giving it jjlace rather than the note in the interleaved
Museum, from which, however, he borrowed almost verbatim
the sentence in parenthesis — " it is an excellent but some-
what licentious song " — which is not in the Edinburgh
University Manuscript. Contiriuing, Dick stresses another
objection to the authenticity of this note thuswise : " Here
Cromek refers to the " fifth "" volume of the Museum, which
did not exist. It was not published until six months after
the death of Burns, and therefore could not have been
noticed by him, particularlj^ as the last notes in the inter-
leaved Museum were penned about three or four years before
the volume was published, and before any arrangement
was made for sketching its contents." Nevertheless, this
other manuscript, which was probably written towards the
close of the Poet's hfe, shows that he did mention the fifth
volume of the Scots Musical Museuyn. He must have
done a lot of work upon it, apart from his own contri-
butions, in the way of determining its contents, and pro-
bably correcting proofs, and, expecting its early publication,
speaks of it here as already in being. By the way, when
was volume V. published ? Dick gives December, 1796,
but John Glen — unfortunately without indicating his
reasons — dates it March, 1797.

Item 31 : " Clout the Caldron.'' — This comes first in
the " Spurious Notes," as given by Mr Dick (p. 74). The
manuscript is exactly as printed in Cromek's BeUques
of Robert Burns, p. 199.

Item 32 : " Auld Lang Syne." — Once more in this
manuscript we find Burns referring to the fifth volume
of the Museum. Dick says (p. 123) Cromek " omits what
Burns wrote." What Burns wrote in the interleaved copy

21

u^<i(f cVmJ i^\CL Ul cW ^ciuii^d^

O \> W <^iA./(/ Ui'ysh K/Xjr,-^ - — ^- . /

f/k ivJa. A(WL Aaac) 0/ c' :^^ ^, Wv ,
/«A.vv ^u/^ -^^ iJ<yr\^^ -^

First Published Facsimile.

From the Interleaved Copy of The Scots Musical Museum (by kind permission
of the owner of the original, Dr John Giibbel, of Philadelphia).

22

of the Scots Musical Museum was a copy of " Auld Lang
Syne," headed, ' The original and by much the best set
of the words of this song is as follows :" A facsimile of that
page — one of the most interesting in the whole of that
unique and remarkable volume — ^was kindly given to me
by Mr Gribbel, and is herewith illustrated, being, I believe,
the first portion of the famous interleaved co])y of the
Scots Musical Museum published in facsimile.

Item 33 : " Dainty Davie.'' — Mr Dick (p. 123), speak-
ing of Cromek's note in the Beliques {]i. 304), says : "...
that on ' Dainty Davie ' is a suppression of the note in
the manuscript, to interpolate and repeat in detail the old
chesnut about the Rev. David Williamson and the daughter
of the Laird of Cherry trees." The fact is that Cromek
used both manuscripts. He took the anecdote from the
one we now distinguish as the Excise Paper, or Edinburgh
University Manuscript, and then, far from suppressing
the short note in the interleaved Musemn, neatly dove-
tailed " a kennin " more than half of it — reading : '' and
were their delicacy equal to their wit and humour thej-
would merit a place in any collection " — into the other.
He also took the word " original " from the Museum
holograph, and inserted it before " song " in his printing
of its less famous fellow, as well as cutting out the words
"and has merit in its way" as in our MS., the expansion
of the sentence having rendered them superfluous.

The earhest printed account of the " Dainty Davie "
story, I have found, is in the first edition of The Scotch
Presbyterian Eloquence, 1692, ]). 5, a work which has also
what is probably the first use in literature of the vernacular
phrase, " For aid lang syne." Mr Dick cites the second
edition of 1694, p. 64, for that distinction (64 is probably
a printer's error, for it should be 68) ; but it is on page 101
of the first edition, and also on page 80 of an earlier second
edition dated 1693.

Item 34: '' Tiveedside.'' —J. C. Dick (p. 87) says:
" The verses quoted in Cromek's Beliques are not in the

23

manuscript." Here again Cromek has simply utilised
both manuscripts, making the one note follow the other,
and the portion on page 214 of the Reliques, beginning
" I have seen a song," is from his supplementary manu-
script—the one now in the Library of Edinburgh University.

After this wholesale restoration, there remain of the
Notes labelled " Spurious " by Mr Dick three very short
ones — " Polwart on the Green," " The Shepherd's Com-
plaint," " We ran and they ran " — and a longer one entitled
" The bonie lass made the bed to me," which are not to
be found in either of the Burns Manuscripts known to be
used by Cromek. These are naturally open to suspicion,
and till further evidence transpires may be regarded as
doubtful ; but in view of the readjustment of opinion
rendered necessary by this latest discovery. I would, even
while remembering R. H. Cromek's editoral idiosyncrasies,
hesitate to brand them as " spurious." Cromek may have
had access to still another unsuspected Burns Manuscript,
and even the additional Notes of the Select Scotish Songs,
while still more open to doubt, may prove in the end to be
the work of Robert Burns.

Incidentally, the increase of confidence in the Cromek-
Burns text goes a long way towards establishing the
authenticity of that important note on " Highland Mary,"
of which I believe some of us have had suspicions since
Mr Dick's disclosure of Cromek's shortcomings as an
editor, and his revelation of the fact that the interleaf,
which should, according to the Reliques, contain nearly all
that Burns wrote about Highland Mary, is, with others,
missing from the book. By whatever hand it was ab-
stracted, it is to be hoped that the " Highland Mary "
leaf and its fellows will some day be discovered, and
eventually restored to the volume annotated by Burns
for his friend Robert Riddell of Glenriddell.

EX LIBRIS • JOHN GRIBBEL

ST- AUSTELL HALL

UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY

Los Angeles
This book is DUE on the last date stamped below.

JflW 1 "y 1948

JAN 1 2 mt)

nm^ 1195!^

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