The Complete Works of Robert Burns Part 119

CV.

WHAN I SLEEP I DREAM.

[This presents another version of song LXV. Variations are to a poet what changes are in the thoughts of a painter, and speak of fertility of sentiment in both.]

I.

Whan I sleep I dream, Whan I wauk I'm eerie, Sleep I canna get, For thinkin' o' my dearie.

II.

Lanely night comes on, A' the house are sleeping, I think on the bonnie lad That has my heart a keeping.

Ay waukin O, waukin ay and wearie, Sleep I canna get, for thinkin' o' my dearie.

III.

Lanely nights come on, A' the house are sleeping, I think on my bonnie lad, An' I blear my een wi' greetin'!

Ay waukin, &c.

CVI.

I MURDER HATE.

[These verses are to be found in a volume which may be alluded to without being named, in which many of Burns's strains, some looser than these, are to be found.]

I.

I murder hate by field or flood, Tho' glory's name may screen us: In wars at hame I'll spend my blood, Life-giving wars of Venus.

II.

The deities that I adore Are social Peace and Plenty, I'm better pleas'd to make one more, Than be the death of twenty.

CVII.

O GUDE ALE COMES.

[These verses are in the museum; the first two are old, the concluding one is by Burns.]

I.

O gude ale comes, and gude ale goes, Gude ale gars me sell my hose, Sell my hose, and p.a.w.n my shoon, Gude ale keeps my heart aboon.

II.

I had sax owsen in a pleugh, They drew a' weel eneugh, I sell'd them a' just ane by ane; Gude ale keeps my heart aboon.

III.

Gude ale hands me bare and busy, Gars me moop wi' the servant hizzie, Stand i' the stool when I hae done, Gude ale keeps my heart aboon.

O gude ale comes, &c.

CVIII.

ROBIN SHURE IN HAIRST.

[This is an old chaunt, out of which Burns brushed some loose expressions, added the third and fourth verses, and sent it to the Museum.]

I.

Robin shure in hairst, I shure wi' him, Fient a heuk had I, Yet I stack by him.

II.

I gaed up to Dunse, To warp a wab o' plaiden, At his daddie's yett, Wha met me but Robin.

III.

Was na Robin bauld, Tho' I was a cotter, Play'd me sic a trick, And me the eller's dochter?

Robin share in hairst, &c.

IV.

Robin promis'd me A' my winter vittle; Fient haet he had but three Goose feathers and a whittle.

Robin share in hairst, &c.