A Night Out with Burns

by Robert Burns

  But left behind her ain gray tail:

  The carlin claught her by the rump,

  And left poor Maggie scarce a stump.

  Now, wha this tale o’ truth shall read,

  Ilk man and mother’s son, take heed:

  Whene’er to drink you are inclin’d,

  Or cutty-sarks run in your mind,

  Think, ye may buy the joys o’er dear,

  Remember Tam o’ Shanter’s mare.

  ‘Auld Scotland has a raucle tongue,’ writes Burns, well-oiled, if chance should favour, with words and whisky. More than any other poet, Burns saw liberty and whisky going together; he would study politics ‘over a glass of guid auld Scotch Drink’ in the bothy at Nance Tinnock’s in Mauchline, and nothing could raise his hackles like the threat of English tax on the aqua vitae. You get the feeling that Burns’s nights at the pub were hot with irony: for him the frisky juice can make a man see straight, while others squint as they thirst for power.

  The Author’s Earnest Cry and Prayer, to the Right Honorable and Honorable, the Scotch Representatives in the House of Commons

  1

  Dearest of Distillation! last and best!—

  —How art thou lost!—

  Parody on Milton

  Ye Irish lords, ye knights an’ squires,

  Wha represent our BRUGHS an’ SHIRES,

  An’ dousely manage our affairs

  In Parliament,

  To you a simple Bardie’s pray’rs

  Are humbly sent.

  Alas! my roupet Muse is haerse!

  Your Honors’ hearts wi’ grief ’twad pierce,

  To see her sittan on her arse

  Low i’ the dust,

  An’ scriechan out prosaic verse,

  An’ like to brust!

  Tell them wha hae the chief direction,

  Scotland and me’s in great affliction,

  E’er sin’ they laid that curst restriction

  On AQUAVITAE;

  An’ rouse them up to strong conviction,

  An’ move their pity.

  Stand forth and tell yon PREMIER YOUTH

  The honest, open, naked truth;

  Tell him o’ mine an’ Scotland’s drouth,

  His servants humble:

  The muckle devil blaw you south,

  If ye dissemble!

  Does ony great man glunch an’ gloom?

  Speak out an’ never fash your thumb!

  Let posts an’ pensions sink or swoom

  Wi’ them wha grant them:

  If honestly they canna come,

  Far better want them.

  In gath’rin votes ye were na slack,

  Now stand as tightly by your tack:

  Ne’er claw your lug, an’ fidge your back,

  An’ hum an’ haw,

  But raise your arm, an’ tell your crack

  Before them a’.

  Paint Scotland greetan owre her thrissle;

  Her mutchkin stowp as toom’s a whissle;

  An’ damn’d Excise-men in a bussle,

  Seizan a Stell,

  Triumphant crushan’t like a muscle

  Or laimpet shell.

  Then on the tither hand present her,

  A blackguard Smuggler, right behint her,

  An’, cheek-for-chow, a chuffie Vintner,

  Colleaguing join,—

  Picking her pouch as bare as Winter,

  Of a’ kind coin.

  Is there, that bears the name o’ SCOT,

  But feels his heart’s bluid rising hot,

  To see his poor, auld Mither’s pot,

  Thus dung in staves;

  An’ plunder’d o’ her hindmost groat,

  By gallows knaves?

  Alas! I’m but a nameless wight,

  Trode i’ the mire out o’ sight!

  But could I like MONTGOMERIES fight,

  Or gab like BOSWEL,

  There’s some sark-necks I wad draw tight,

  An’ tye some hose well.

  God bless your Honors, can ye see’t,

  The kind, auld, cantie Carlin greet,

  An’ no get warmly to your feet,

  An’ gar them hear it,

  An’ tell them, wi’ a patriot-heat,

  Ye winna bear it?

  Some o’ you nicely ken the laws,

  To round the period an’ pause,

  An’ with rhetoric clause on clause

  To mak harangues;

  Then echo thro’ Saint Stephen’s wa’s

  Auld Scotland’s wrangs.

  Dempster, a true-blue Scot I’se warran;

  Thee, aith-detesting, chaste Kilkerran;

  An’ that glib-gabbet Highlan Baron,

  The Laird o’ Graham;

  And ane, a chap that’s damn’d auldfarran,

  Dundass his name.

  Erskine, a spunkie norland billie;

  True Campbels, Frederic an’ Ilay;

  An’ Livistone, the bauld Sir Willie;

  An’ mony ithers,

  Whom auld Demosthenes or Tully

  Might own for brithers.

  Arouse my boys! exert your mettle,

  To get auld Scotland back her kettle!

  Or faith! I’ll wad my new pleugh-pettle,

  Ye’ll see’t or lang,

  She’ll teach you, wi’ a reekan whittle,

  Anither sang.

  This while she’s been in crankous mood,

  Her lost Militia fir’d her bluid;

  (Deil na they never mair do guid,

  Play’d her that pliskie!)

  An’ now she’s like to rin red-wud

  About her Whisky.

  An’ Lord! if ance they pit her till’t,

  Her tartan petticoat she’ll kilt,

  An’ durk an’ pistol at her belt,

  She’ll tak the streets,

  An’ rin her whittle to the hilt,

  I’ th’ first she meets!

  For God-sake, Sirs! then speak her fair,

  An’ straik her cannie wi’ the hair,

  An’ to the muckle house repair,

  Wi’ instant speed,

  An’ strive, wi’ a’ your Wit an’ Lear,

  To get remead.

  Yon ill-tongu’d tinkler, Charlie Fox,

  May taunt you wi’ his jeers an’ mocks;

  But gie him’t het, my hearty cocks!

  E’en cowe the cadie!

  An’ send him to his dicing box,

  An’ sportin lady.

  Tell yon guid bluid o’ auld Boconnock’s,

  I’ll be his debt twa mashlum bonnocks,

  An’ drink his health in auld Nance Tinnock’s

  2

  Nine times a week,

  If he some scheme, like tea an’ winnocks,

  Wad kindly seek.

  Could he some commutation broach,

  I’ll pledge my aith in guid braid Scotch,

  He need na fear their foul reproach

  Nor erudition,

  Yon mixtie-maxtie, queer hotch-potch,

  The Coalition.

  Auld Scotland has a raucle tongue;

  She’s just a devil wi’ a rung;

  An’ if she promise auld or young

  To tak their part,

  Tho’ by the neck she should be strung,

  She’ll no desert.

  And now, ye chosen FIVE AND FORTY,

  May still your Mither’s heart support ye;

  Then tho’ a Minister grow dorty,

  An’ kick your place,

  Ye’ll snap your fingers, poor an’ hearty,

  Before his face.

  God bless your Honors, a’ your days,

  Wi’ sowps o’ kail an’ brats o’ claise,

  In spite of a’ the thievish kaes

  That haunt St Jamie’s!

  Your humble Bardie sings an’ prays

  While Rab his name is.

  POSTSCRIPT

  Let half-starv’d slaves in warmer skies,

  See future wines, rich-
clust’ring, rise;

  Their lot auld Scotland ne’er envies,

  But blyth an’ frisky,

  She eyes her freeborn, martial boys,

  Tak aff their Whisky.

  What tho’ their Phebus kinder warms,

  While Fragrance blooms and Beauty charms!

  When wretches range, in famish’d swarms,

  The scented groves,

  Or hounded forth, dishonor arms,

  In hungry droves.

  Their gun’s a burden on their shouther;

  They downa bide the stink o’ powther;

  Their bauldest thought’s a hank’ring swither,

  To stan’ or rin,

  Till skelp—a shot—they’re aff, a’ throu’ther,

  To save their skin.

  But bring a SCOTCHMAN frae his hill,

  Clap in his cheek a highlan gill,

  Say, such is royal GEORGE’S will,

  An’ there’s the foe,

  He has nae thought but how to kill

  Twa at a blow.

  Nae cauld, faint-hearted doubtings tease him;

  Death comes, with fearless eye he sees him;

  Wi’ bluidy hand a welcome gies him;

  An’ when he fa’s,

  His latest draught o’ breathin lea’es him

  In faint huzzas.

  Sages their solemn een may steek,

  An’ raise a philosophic reek,

  An’ physically causes seek,

  In clime an’ season,

  But tell me Whisky’s name in Greek,

  I’ll tell the reason.

  SCOTLAND, my auld, respected Mither!

  Tho’ whyles ye moistify your leather,

  Till when ye speak, ye aiblins blether;

  Yet deil-mak-matter!

  FREEDOM and WHISKY gang thegither,

  Tak aff you whitter.

  ‘Love and Liberty’ is the ultimate secular cantata, set in an Ayrshire pub. A sequence of separate movements coralled into a spirited chamber piece, it might be considered a close relation of Bach’s Peasant Cantata, which features a pair of singers on their way to an inn and plays with notions of rustic accents. In its dramatic structure, the poem owes something to the musical form, but Burns politicises the conditions of these jolly beggars in a way that must have seemed shocking when it was eventually published in 1799. A touch of France hangs over the smoky parlour and that final chorus:

  A fig for those by law protected!

  LIBERTY’S a glorious feast!

  Courts for Cowards were erected,

  Churches built to please the PRIEST.

  Love and Liberty–A Cantata

  RECITATIVO

  When lyart leaves bestrow the yird,

  Or wavering like the Bauckie-bird,

  1

  Bedim cauld Boreas’ blast;

  When hailstanes drive wi’ bitter skyte,

  And infant Frosts begin to bite,

  In hoary cranreuch drest;

  Ae night at e’en a merry core

  O’ randie, gangrel bodies,

  In Poosie-Nansie’s

  2

  held the splore,

  To drink their orra dudies:

  Wi’ quaffing, and laughing,

  They ranted an’ they sang;

  Wi’ jumping, an’ thumping,

  The vera girdle rang.

  First, neist the fire, in auld, red rags,

  Ane sat; weel brac’d wi’ mealy bags,

  And knapsack a’ in order;

  His doxy lay within his arm;

  Wi’ USQUEBAE an’ blankets warm,

  She blinket on her Sodger:

  An’ ay he gies the tozie drab

  The tither skelpan kiss,

  While she held up her greedy gab,

  Just like an aumous dish:

  Ilk smack still, did crack still,

  Just like a cadger’s whip;

  Then staggering, an’ swaggering,

  He roar’d this ditty up—

  AIR

  I am a Son of Mars who have been in many wars,

  And show my cuts and scars wherever I come;

  This here was for a wench, and that other in a trench,

  When welcoming the French at the sound of the drum.

  Lal de daudle, &c.

  My Prenticeship I past where my LEADER breath’d his last,

  When the bloody die was cast on the heights of ABRAM;

  And I served out my TRADE when the gallant game was play’d,

  And the MORO low was laid at the sound of the drum.

  I lastly was with Curtis among the floating batt’ries,

  And there I left for witness, an arm and a limb;

  Yet let my Country need me, with ELLIOT to head me,

  I’d clatter on my stumps at the sound of a drum.

  And now tho’ I must beg, with a wooden arm and leg,

  And many a tatter’d rag hanging over my bum,

  I’m as happy with my wallet, my bottle and my Callet,

  As when I us’d in scarlet to follow a drum.

  What tho’, with hoary locks, I must stand the winter shocks,

  Beneath the woods and rocks oftentimes for a home,

  When the tother bag I sell and the tother bottle tell,

  I could meet a troop of HELL at the sound of a drum.

  RECITATIVO

  He ended; and the kebars sheuk,

  Aboon the chorus roar;

  While frighted rattons backward leuk,

  An’ seek the benmost bore:

  A fairy FIDDLER frae the neuk,

  He skirl’d out, ENCORE.

  But up arose the martial CHUCK,

  An’ laid the loud uproar—

  AIR

  I once was a Maid, tho’ I cannot tell when,

  And still my delight is in proper young men:

  Some one of a troop of DRAGOONS was my dadie,

  No wonder I’m fond of a SODGER LADDIE,

  Sing lal de lal, &c.

  The first of my LOVES was a swaggering blade,

  To rattle the thundering drum was his trade;

  His leg was so tight and his cheek was so ruddy,

  Transported I was with my SODGER LADDIE.

  But the godly old Chaplain left him in the lurch,

  The sword I forsook for the sake of the church;

  He ventur’d the Soul, and I risked the BODY,

  ’Twas then I prov’d false to my SODGER LADDIE.

  Full soon I grew sick of my sanctified Sot,

  The Regiment AT LARGE for a HUSBAND I got;

  From the gilded SPONTOON to the FIFE I was ready;

  I asked no more but a SODGER LADDIE.