Robert Burns (1759–1796). Poems and Songs.
The Harvard Classics. 1909–14.
307 . Elegy on Captain Matthew Henderson
O D
The meikle devil wi’ a woodie
Haurl thee hame to his black smiddie,
O’er hurcheon hides,
Wi’ thy auld sides! The ae best fellow e’er was born! Thee, Matthew, Nature’s sel’ shall mourn, By wood and wild, Where haply, Pity strays forlorn, Frae man exil’d. That proudly cock your cresting cairns! Ye cliffs, the haunts of sailing earns, Where Echo slumbers! Come join, ye Nature’s sturdiest bairns, My wailing numbers! Ye haz’ly shaws and briery dens! Ye burnies, wimplin’ down your glens, Wi’ toddlin din, Or foaming, strang, wi’ hasty stens, Frae lin to lin. Ye stately foxgloves, fair to see; Ye woodbines hanging bonilie, In scented bow’rs; Ye roses on your thorny tree, The first o’ flow’rs. Droops with a diamond at his head, At ev’n, when beans their fragrance shed, I’ th’ rustling gale, Ye maukins, whiddin thro’ the glade, Come join my wail. Ye grouse that crap the heather bud; Ye whistling plover; And mourn, we whirring paitrick brood; He’s gane for ever! Ye fisher herons, watching eels; Ye duck and drake, wi’ airy wheels Circling the lake; Ye bitterns, till the quagmire reels, Rair for his sake. ’Mang fields o’ flow’ring clover gay; And when ye wing your annual way Frae our claud shore, Tell thae far warlds wha lies in clay, Wham we deplore. In some auld tree, or eldritch tow’r, What time the moon, wi’ silent glow’r, Sets up her horn, Wail thro’ the dreary midnight hour, Till waukrife morn! Oft have ye heard my canty strains; But now, what else for me remains But tales of woe; And frae my een the drapping rains Maun ever flow. Ilk cowslip cup shall kep a tear: Thou, Simmer, while each corny spear Shoots up its head, Thy gay, green, flow’ry tresses shear, For him that’s dead! In grief thy sallow mantle tear! Thou, Winter, hurling thro’ the air The roaring blast, Wide o’er the naked world declare The worth we’ve lost! Mourn, Empress of the silent night! And you, ye twinkling starnies bright, My Matthew mourn! For through your orbs he’s ta’en his flight, Ne’er to return. And art thou gone, and gone for ever! And hast thou crost that unknown river, Life’s dreary bound! Like thee, where shall I find another, The world around! In a’ the tinsel trash o’ state! But by thy honest turf I’ll wait, Thou man of worth! And weep the ae best fellow’s fate E’er lay in earth.