Contents -BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD

Stevenson, Robert Louis (1850–1894). A Child’s Garden of Verses and Underwoods. 1913.

XI. Embro Hie Kirk

THE LORD HIMSEL’ in former days

Waled out the proper tünes for praise

An’ named the proper kind o’ claes

For folk to preach in:

Preceese and in the chief o’ ways

Important teachin’.

He ordered a’ things late and air’;

He ordered folk to stand at prayer.

(Although I cannae just mind where

He gave the warnin’.)

An’ pit pomatum on their hair

On Sabbath mornin’.

The hale o’ life by His commands

Was ordered to a body’s hands;

But see! this corpus juris stands

By a’ forgotten;

An’ God’s religion in a’ lands

Is deid an’ rotten.

While thus the lave o’ mankind’s lost,

O’ Scotland still God maks His boast—

Puir Scotland, on whase barren coast

A score or twa

Auld wives wi’ mutches an’ a hoast

Still keep His law.

In Scotland, a wheen canty, plain,

Douce, kintry-leevin’ folk retain

The Truth—or did so aince—alane

Of a’ men leevin’;

An’ noo just twa o’ them remain—

Just Begg an’ Niven.

For noo, unfaithfü to the Lord

Auld Scotland joins the rebel horde;

Her human hymn-books on the board

She noo displays:

An’ Embro Hie Kirk’s been restored

In popish ways.

O punctum temporis for action

To a’ o’ the reformin’ faction,

If yet, by ony act or paction,

Thocht, word, or sermon,

This dark an’ damnable transaction

Micht yet determine!

For see—as Doctor Begg explains—

Hoo easy ’t’s düne! a pickle weans,

Wha in the Hie Street gaither stanes

By his instruction,

The uncovenantit, pentit panes

Ding to destruction.

Up, Niven, or ower late—an’ dash

Laigh in the glaur that carnal hash;

Let spires and pews wi’ gran’ stramash

Thegether fa’;

The rumlin’ kist o’ whustles smash

In pieces sma’.

Noo choose ye out a waie hammer;

About the knottit buttress clam’er;

Alang the steep roof stoyt an’ stammer,

A gate mis-chancy;

On the aul’ spire, the bells’ hie cha’mer,

Dance your bit dancie.

Ding, devel, dunt, destroy, an’ ruin,

Wi’ carnal stanes the square bestrewin’,

Till your loud chaps frae Kyle to Fruin,

Frae Hell to Heeven,

Tell the guid wark that baith are doin’—

Baith Begg an’ Niven.