Page:Fugitive Poetry 1600-1878.djvu/437

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I'll Gang Nae Mair to Yon Town.

I'll gang nae mair to yon town,
Betide me joy, betide me pain;
I've tint my heart in yon town,
And dare nae gang the gate again.
The sun shall cease to thowe the snaw,
The corn to shoot wi' simmer rain,
When I gang back to yon town,
And see the gate my heart has gane.

Yestreen I went to yon town,
Wi' heart in pleasure panting free,
As stag won from the hunter's snare,
Or birdie building on the tree;
But ae half-hour tint all my peace,
And laired my soul in dool and pain,
And weary fa' the witchcraft wit
That winna let it free again.

Had I but been by fortune's hand
In the silk lap of grandeur thrown,
And she had trimmed the humblest home
That ever rose in Caledon;
I'd clad her in a starry robe,
And claspt her to my bosom fain;
And blest the happy hour I went
To see the mirthsome town again.

She's fairer than a summer morn,
And purer than the spotless sky;
Far is the journey to her heart,
She measures in her haughty eye.
But she is sweeter than the rose
New bathed amang the balmy rain—
And I maun gang to yon town,
And see the lovesome maid again.

The Mariner's Song.

'Tis a time of pride when the bark is prancing,
Like an Arab steed, o'er the waste of waves,
When her path behind in light is glancing,
And the fire-white foam her bowsprit laves;

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