THE COTTER'S SATURDAY NIGHT ROBERT BURNS NOTE,-There are many homes we like to visit in imagination, even if we cannot really go into them. It does not matter so much if they are not the homes of people in our own country who live as we do. For instance, Robert Burns described so well for us once the simple little home of a poor Scotch farmer that we read his words again and again with pleasure. It is such a poor little place, low-walled, thatchedroofed, part stable, that it would be unpleasant to us if we did not see it full of the spirit that makes true homes everywhere. The hard-working old farmer, his faithful wife, their industrious children, the oldest girl Jenny and her lover, all seem to us like very real people, whose joys and griefs are ours as much as theirs. We should like to sit with them at their humble table, to join in the good old hymns, and finally to kneel among them while the gentle old man said the evening prayer. We would not notice their homely clothes, coarse hands, and simple, unscholarly language, for their real manliness and womanliness would win our esteem and love. On the pages that follow we have printed the poem as Burns wrote it, except for some few stanzas it has seemed best to omit. The first nine stanzas contain many Scottish words and expressions, but after the ninth stanza, Burns uses plain English. It was a habit he had of writing sometimes in Scotch dialect and sometimes in fine English. P People who have studied his work say that when he speaks right from his heart and because he really cannot help writing, he uses the dialect, but when he tries to teach a lesson, to advise any one, or to moralize, he always uses the English phraseology. I November chill blaws loud wi' angry sugh:' The short'ning winter day is near a close; The miry beasts retreating frae the pleugh;3 The black'ning trains o' craws to their repose: The toil-worn cotter frae his labour goes, This night his weekly moil' is at an end, Collects his spades, his mattocks, and his hoes, Hoping the morn in ease and rest to spend, And weary, o'er the moor, his course does hameward bend. II At length his lonely cot appears in view, Th' expectant wee-things, toddlin', stacher" thro' 1. Sugh means a hollow, roaring sound. It is our word sough. 2. Frae is the Scotch word meaning from. 3. Pleugh means plow. 4. Moil is a Scotch word meaning drudgery. 5. A mattock is a two-bladed instrument for digging. 6. Stacher is the Scotch form of stagger. To meet their dad, wi' flichterin" noise an' glee. His wee bit ingle, blinkin' bonnily, His clean hearth-stane, his thriftie wifie's smile, The lisping infant prattling on his knee, Does a' his weary carkings cares beguile, An' makes him quite forget his labour and his toil. 7. Flichtering means fluttering. & Carking is trying. III Belyve, the elder bairns come drappin' in, At service out, amang the farmers roun'; Some ca'1o the pleugh, some herd, some tentie11 rin A cannie12 errand to a neebor town: Their eldest hope, their Jenny, woman grown, In youthfu' bloom, love sparklin' in her e'e, Comes hame, perhaps, to show a braw13 new gown, Or deposit her sair-won1 penny fee, To help her parents dear, if they in hardship be. IV Wi' joy unfeign'd, brothers and sisters meet, And each for other's weelfare kindly spiers:15 The social hours, swift-wing'd, unnoticed fleet: Each tells the uncos16 that he sees or hears; The parents, partial, eye their hopeful years; Anticipation forward points the view; The mother, wi' her needle an' her shears, Gars auld claes look amaist as weel's the new;17 The father mixes a' wi' admonition due. ones. 9. Belyve means soon. 10. Ca' means drive. 11. Tentie means carefully. 12. Cannie means here prudent, or trusty. 13. Braw is fine, gay. 14. Sair-won is hard-earned. 15. Spiers means enquires. 16. The uncos is the news. 17. This line means Makes old clothes look almost as well as new V Their master's an' their mistress's command, The younkers18 a' are warned to obey: "An' mind their labours wi' an eydent1 hand, An' ne'er, tho' out o' sight, to jauk20 or play: An' O! be sure to fear the Lord alway! An' mind your duty, duly, morn an' night! Lest in temptation's path ye gang astray, Implore his counsel and assisting might: They never sought in vain, that sought the Lord aright!" VI 21 But hark! a rap comes gently to the door; Jenny, wha kens the meaning o' the same, Tells how a neebor lad cam' o'er the moor, To do some errands, and convoy her hame."1 The wily mother sees the conscious flame Sparkle in Jenny's e'e,22 and flush her cheek; With heart-struck, anxious care, inquires, his name, While Jenny hafflins23 is afraid to speak; Weel pleas'd the mother hears, it's nae wild, worthless rake. 18. The younkers are the youngsters. 19. Eydent is diligent. 20. To jauk is to trifle. 21. Hame is the Scotch form of our word home. 22. E'e is a contraction for eye. 23. Haflins means partly. 24. Nae means no. |