By which heroic Tom was able
To note upon the haly table,
A murderer's banes in gibbet airns;
Twa span-lang, wee, unchristened
bairns:

A thief, new-cutted frae a rape,
Wi' his last gasp his gab did gape;
Five tomahawks, wi' blude red
rusted;

Five scymitars, wi' murder crusted; A garter, which a babe had strangled;

A knife, a father's throat had mangled,

Whom his ain son o' life bereft,

The gray hairs yet stack to the heft; Wi' mair o' horrible and awfu', Which even to name wad be unlawfu'.

As Tammie glowered, amazed and curious,

The mirth and fun grew fast and furious:

The piper loud and louder blew; The dancers quick and quicker flew; They reeled, they set, they crossed,

they cleekit,

Till ilka carlin sweat and reekit, And coost her duddies to the wark, And linket at it in her sark!

Now Tam, O Tam! had thae been

queans,

A' plump and strapping in their teens;

Their sarks, instead o' creeshie flannen,

Been snaw-white seventeen-hunder linnen!

Thir breeks o' mine, my only pair, That ance were plush, o' gude blue hair,

I wad hae gi'en them off my hurdies,

For ae blink o' the bonnie burdies! But withered beldams, auld and droll,

Rigwoodie hags, wad spean a foal, Lowping and flinging on a crummock,

I wonder didna turn thy stomach.

But Tam kend what was what fu' brawlie,

"There was ae winsome wench and walie,"

That night enlisted in the core,
(Lang after kend on Carrick shore;
For mony a beast to dead she shot,
And perished mony a bonnie boat,

And shook baith meikle corn and bear,

And kept the country-side in fear,)
Her cutty-sark, o' Paisley harn,
That, while a lassie, she had worn,
In longitude though sorely scanty,
It was her best and she was vaunt-
ie.

Ah! little kend thy reverend grannie,

That sark she coft for her wee Nannie,

Wi' twa pund Scots, ('twas a' her riches,)

Wad ever graced a dance o' witches! But here my muse her wing maun

cour;

Sic flights are far beyond her power; To sing how Nannie lap and flang (A souple jade she was, and strang), And how Tam stood, like ane bewitched,

And thought his very e'en enriched; Even Satan glowered, and fidged fu' fain,

And hotched and blew wi' might and main:

Till first ane caper, syne anither, Tam tint his reason a' thegither, And roars out, "Weel done, Cuttysark!"

And in an instant all was dark; And scarcely had he Maggie rallied, When out the hellish legion sallied.

As bees bizz out wi' angry fyke, When plundering herds assail their byke;

As open pussie's mortal foes,
When, pop! she starts before their

nose;

As eager runs the market-crowd, When, "Catch the thief!" resounds aloud;

So Maggie runs, the witches follow, Wi' monie an eldritch screech and hollow.

Ah, Tam! ah, Tam! thou'll get thy fairin!

In hell they'll roast thee like a herrin!

In vain thy Kate awaits thy comin! Kate soon will be a woefu' woman! Now, do thy speedy utmost, Meg, And win the key-stane of the brig; There at them thou thy tail may

toss,

A running stream they dare na

cross.

"It rang sae sweet through the green Lommond,

Sae sweetly and sae shrill, That the weasels leaped out of their mouldy holes,

And danced on the midnight hill.

"The corby crow came gledging near,

The erne gaed veering bye; And the trouts leaped out of the Leven Loch,

Charmed with the melodye.

"And aye we danced on the green Lommond,

Till the dawn on the ocean grew: Nae wonder I was a weary wight

When I cam hame to you."

"What guid, what guid, my weird, weird wyfe,

What guid was that to thee? Ye wad better have been in yer bed at hame,

Wi' yer dear little bairns and me."

"The second night, when the new moon set,

O'er the roaring sea we flew; The cockle-shell our trusty bark, Our sails of the green sea-rue.

"And the bauld winds blew, and the fire-flauchts flew,

And the sea ran to the sky; And the thunder it growled, and the sea-dogs howled,

As we gaed scurrying by.

"And aye we mounted the sea-green hills,

Till we brushed through the clouds of heaven,

Then soused downright like the stern-shot light,

Fra the lift's blue casement driven.

"But our tackle stood, and our bark was good,

And sae pang was our pearly prow; When we couldna speil the brow of the waves,

We needled them through below.

"As fast as the hail, as fast as the gale,

As fast as the midnight leme,

We bored the breast of the bursting swale,

Or fluffed in the floating faem.

"And when to the Norroway shore we wan,

We mounted our steeds of the wind, And we splashed the floode, and we darnit the wood,

And we left the shore behind.

"Fleet is the roe on the green Lommond,

And swift is the couryng grew; The rein-deer dun can eithly run, When the hounds and the horns

pursue.

"But neither the roe, nor the reindeer dun,

The hind nor the couryng grew, Could fly o'er mountain, moor, and dale,

As our braw steeds they flew.

"The dales were deep, and the Doffrins steep,

And we rose to the skies ee-bree: White, white was our road that was never trode,

O'er the snows of eternity.

"And when we came to the Lapland lone,

The fairies were all in array, For all the genii of the north Were keeping their holiday.

"The warlock men and the weird women,

And the fays of the wood and the steep,

And the phantom hunters all were there,

And the mermaids of the deep.

"And they washed us all with the witch-water,

Distilled frae the moorland dew, Till our beauty bloomed like the Lapland rose,

That wild in the foreste grew."

"Ye lee, ye lee, ye ill woman,

Sae loud as I hear ye lee! For the worst-faured wyfe on the shores of Fyfe

Is comely compared wi' thee."

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