LAMENT OF MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS ON THE APPROACH OF SPRING

Now Nature hangs her mantle green

On every blooming tree

And spreads her sheets o’ daisies white

Out o’er the grassy lea:

Now Phœbus cheers the crystal streams,

And glads the azure skies;

But nought can glad the weary wight

That fast in durance lies.

Now laverocks wake the merry morn,

Aloft on dewy wing;

The merle, in his noontide bower,

Makes woodland echoes ring;

The mavis wild wi monie a note,

Sings drowsy day to rest:

In love and freedom they rejoice,

Wi care nor thrall opprest.

Now blooms the lily by the bank,

The primrose down the brae;

The hawthorn’s budding in the glen,

And milk-white is the slae:

The meanest hind in fair Scotland

May rove their sweets amang;

But I, the Queen of a’ Scotland,

Maun lie in prison strang.

I was the Queen o bonie France,

Where happy I hae been;

Fu lightly rase I in the morn,

As blythe lay down at e’en:

And I’m the sovereign of Scotland,

And monie a traitor there;

Yet here I lie in foreign bands,

And never-ending care.

But as for thee, thou false woman,

My sister and my fae,

Grim vengeance yet shall whet a sword

That thro thy soul shall gae:

The weeping blood in woman’s breast

Was never known to thee;

Nor th’ balm that drops on wounds of woe

Frae woman’s pitying e’e.

My son! my son! may kinder stars

Upon thy fortune shine!

And may those pleasures gild thy reign,

That ne’er wad blink on mine!

God keep thee frae thy mother’s faes,

Or turn their hearts to thee;

And where thou meet’st thy mother’s friend,

Remember him for me!

O! soon, to me, may summer suns

Nae mair light up the morn!

Nae mair to me the autumn winds

Wave o’er the yellow corn!

And, in the narrow house of death,

Let winter round me rave;

And the next flowers that deck the spring,

Bloom on my peaceful grave.

THERE’LL NEVER BE PEACE TILL JAMIE COMES HAME

By yon castle wa’ at the close of the day,

I heard a man sing, tho his head it was grey,

And as he was singing, the tears doon came,

There’ll never be peace till Jamie comes hame. –

The Church is in ruins, the State is in jars,

Delusions, oppressions, and murderous wars:

We dare na weel say’t, but we ken wha’s to blame,

There’ll never be peace till Jamie comes hame. –

My seven braw sons for Jamie drew sword,

But now I greet round their green beds in the yerd;

It brak the sweet heart o my faithfu auld dame,

There’ll never be peace till Jamie comes hame. –

Now life is a burden that bows me down,

Sin I tint my bairns, and he tint his crown;

But till my last moments my words are the same,

There’ll never be peace till Jamie comes hame. –