They never sought in vain that sought the Lord aright.’

But hark! a rap comes gently to the door;

Jenny, wha kens the meaning o the same,

Tells how a neebor lad came o’er the moor,

To do some errands, and convoy her hame.

The wily mother sees the conscious flame

Sparkle in Jenny’s e’e, and flush her cheek;

With heart-struck anxious care, inquires his name,

While Jenny hafflins is afraid to speak;

Weel-pleas’d the mother hears, it’s nae wild, worthless rake.

Wi kindly welcome, Jenny brings him ben;

A strappin youth, he takes the mother’s eye;

Blythe Jenny sees the visit’s no ill-taen;

The father cracks of horses, pleughs, and kye.

The youngster’s artless heart o’erflows wi joy,

But blate an laithfu, scarce can weel behave;

The mother, wi a woman’s wiles, can spy

What makes the youth sae bashfu and sae grave;

Weel-pleas’d to think her bairn’s respected like the lave.

O happy love! where love like this is found:

O heart-felt raptures! bliss beyond compare!

I’ve paced much this weary, mortal round,

And sage experience bids me this declare –

‘If Heaven a draught of heavenly pleasure spare,

One cordial in this melancholy vale,

’Tis when a youthful, loving, modest pair

In other’s arms, breathe out the tender tale,

Beneath the milk-white thorn that scents the ev’ning gale.’

Is there, in human form, that bears a heart –

A wretch! a villain! lost to love and truth!

That can, with studied, sly, ensnaring art,

Betray sweet Jenny’s unsuspecting youth?

Curse on his perjur’d arts! dissembling, smooth!

Are honor, virtue, conscience, all exil’d?

Is there no pity, no relenting Ruth,

Points to the parents fondling o’er their child?

Then paints the ruin’d maid, and their distraction wild?

But now the supper crowns their simple board,

The halesome parritch, chief o Scotia’s food;

The soupe their only hawkie does afford,

That, ’yont the hallan snugly chows her cood:

The dame brings forth, in complimental mood,

To grace the lad, her weel-hain’d kebbuck, fell;

And aft he’s prest, and aft he ca’s it guid:

The frugal wifle, garrulous, will tell,

How ’twas a towmond auld, sin lint was i’ the bell.

The chearfu supper done, wi serious face,

They, round the ingle, form a circle wide,

The sire turns o’er, wi patriarchal grace,

The big ha’-Bible, ance his father’s pride.

His bonnet rev’rently is laid aside,

His lyart haffets wearing thin and bare;

Those strains that once did sweet in Zion glide,

He wales a portion with judicious care;

And ‘Let us worship God!’ he says with solemn air.

They chant their artless notes in simple guise,

They tune their hearts, by far the noblest aim;

Perhaps Dundee’s wild-warbling measures rise,

Or plaintive Martyrs, worthy of the name;

Or noble Elgin beets the heavenward flame,

The sweetest far of Scotia’s holy lays:

Compar’d with these, Italian trills are tame:

The tickl’d ears no heart-felt raptures raise;

Nae unison hae they, with our Creator’s praise.

The priest-like father reads the sacred page,