AULD ROB MORRIS

There's auld Rob Morris that wons in yon glen, [dwells]
He's the king o' gude fellows and wale of auld men; [pick]
He has gowd in his coffers, he has owsen and kine, [gold, oxen]
And ae bonnie lassie, his dautie and mine. [one, darling]

She's fresh as the morning, the fairest in May;
She's sweet as the ev'ning amang the new hay;
As blythe and as artless as the lambs on the lea,
And dear to my heart as the light to my e'e.

But oh! she's an heiress, auld Robin's a laird,
And my daddie has nought but a cot-house and yard; [garden]
A wooer like me maunna hope to come speed, [must not]
The wounds I must hide that will soon be my dead. [death]

The day comes to me, but delight brings me nane;
The night comes to me, but my rest it is gane;
I wander my lane, like a night-troubled ghaist, [alone, ghost]
And I sigh as my heart it wad burst in my breast.

O had she but been of a lower degree,
I then might hae hoped she wad smiled upon me;
O how past descriving had then been my bliss, [describing]
As now my distraction no words can express!

_O, Wert Thou in the Cauld Blast_, besides being one of the most
exquisite of his songs, has a pathetic interest from the circumstances
under which it was composed. During the last few months of his life, a