A Tale
âOf Brownyis and of Bogilis full is this Buke.â
âGawin Douglas.
When chapman billies leave the street,
And drouthy neebors neebors meet,
As market-days are wearing late,
Anâ folk begin to takâ the gate;
While we sit bousing at the *****,
Anâ getting fou and unco happy,
We think na on the lang Scots miles,
The mosses, waters, slaps, and stiles,
That lie between us and our hame,
Whare sits our sulky, sullen dame,
Gathering her brows like gathering storm,
Nursing her wrath to keep it warm.
This truth fand honest Tam oâShanter,
As he frae Ayr ae night did canter,
(Auld Ayr, wham neâer a town surpasses,
For honest men and bonie lasses).
O Tam! hadst thou but been sae wise,
As taâen thy ain wife Kateâs advice!
She tauld thee weel thou was a skellum,
A blethering, blustering, drunken blellum,
That frae November till October,
Ae market-day thou was nae sober;
That ilka melder, wiâ the miller,
Thou sat as lang as thou had siller;
That evâry naig was caâd a shoe on,
The smith and thee gat roarin fou on;
That at the Lordâs house, evân on Sunday,
Thou drank wiâ Kirkton Jean till Monday.
She prophesied that, late or soon,
Thou would be found deep drowned in Doon;
Or catched wiâ warlocks in the mirk,
By Allowayâs auld haunted kirk.
Ah, gentle dames! it gars me greet,
To think how mony counsels sweet,
How mony lengthened sage advices,
The husband frae the wife despises!
But to our tale: Ae market-night,
Tam had got planted unco right;
Fast by an ingle, bleezing finely,
Wiâ reaming swats, that drank divinely;
And at his elbow, Souter Johnny,
His ancient, trusty, drouthy crony;
Tam loâed him like a vera brither;
They had been fou for weeks thegither.
The night drave on wiâ sangs anâ clatter;
And aye the ale was growing better:
The landlady and Tam grew gracious,
Wiâ favours, secret, sweet, and precious:
The Souter tauld his queerest stories;
The landlordâs laugh was ready chorus:
The storm without might rair and rustle,
Tam did na mind the storm a whistle.
Care, mad to see a man sae happy,
Eâen drowned himself amang the *****;
As bees flee hame wiâ lades oâ treasure,
The minutes winged their way wiâ pleasure:
Kings may be blest, but Tam was glorious,
Oâer aâ the ills oâ life victorious!
But pleasures are like poppies spread,
You seize the flowâr, its bloom is shed;
Or like the snow falls in the river,
A moment whiteâthen melts for ever;
Or like the borealis race,
That flit ere you can point their place;
Or like the rainbowâs lovely form
Evanishing amid the storm.â
Nae man can tether time or tide;
The hour approaches Tam maun ride;
That hour, oâ nightâs black arch the key-stane,
That dreary hour he mounts his beast in;
And sic a night he takâs the road in,
As neâer poor sinner was abroad in.
The wind blew as âtwad blawn its last;
The rattling showers rose on the blast;
The speedy gleams the darkness swallowed;
Loud, deep, and lang the thunder bellowed:
That night, a child might understand,
The Deâil had business on his hand.
Weel mounted on his grey mare, Meg,
A better never lifted leg,
Tam skelpit on throâ dub and mire,
Despising wind, and rain, and fire;
Whiles holding fast his gude blue bonnet;
Whiles crooning oâer some auld Scots sonnet;
Whiles glowârin round wiâ prudent cares,
Lest bogles catch him unawares;
Kirk-Alloway was drawing nigh,
Whare ghaists and houlets nightly cry.
By this time he was cross the ford,
Whare in the snaw the chapman smoored;
And past the birks and meikle stane,
Whare drunken Charlie brakâs neck-bane;
And throâ the whins, and by the cairn,
Whare hunters fand the murdered bairn;
And near the thorn, aboon the well,
Whare Mungoâs mither hanged herselâ.
Before him Doon pours all his floods;
The doubling storm roars throâ the woods;
The lightnings flash from pole to pole;
Near and more near the thunders roll;
When, glimmering throâ the groaning trees,
Kirk-Alloway seemed in a bleeze;
Throâ ilka bore the beams were glancing;
And loud resounded mirth and dancing.
Inspiring bold John Barleycorn!
What dangers thou canst makâ us scorn!
Wiâ tippenny, we fear nae evil;
Wiâ usquabae, weâll face the devil!
The swats sae reamed in Tammieâs noddle,
Fair play, he cared na deils a boddle.
But Maggie stood right sair astonished,
Till, by the heel and hand admonished,
She ventured forward on the light;
And, wow! Tam saw an unco sight!
Warlocks and witches in a dance;
Nae cotillion, brent new frae France,
But hornpipes, jigs, strathspeys, and reels,
Put life and mettle in their heels.
A winnock-bunker in the east,
There sat auld Nick, in shape oâ beast;
A towzie tyke, black, grim, and large,
To gie them music was his charge:
He ******* the pipes and gart them skirl,
Till roof and rafters aâ did dirl.â
Coffins stood round, like open presses,
That shawed the Dead in their last dresses;
And by some devilish cantraip sleight
Each in its cauld hand held a light,
By which heroic Tam was able
To note upon the haly table,
A murdererâs banes in gibbet-airns;
Twa span-lang, wee, unchristened bairns;
A thief, new-cutted frae a ****,
Wiâ his last gasp his gab did gape;
Five tomahawks, wiâ blude red-rusted;
Five scimitars, wiâ ****** crusted;
A garter, which a babe had strangled;
A knife, a fatherâs throat had mangled,
Whom his ain son oâ life bereft,
The grey hairs yet stack to the heft;
Wiâ mair of horrible and awfuâ,
Which even to name *** be unlawfuâ.
As Tammie glowered, amazed and curious,
The mirth and fun grew fast and furious:
The Piper loud and louder blew;
The dancers quick and quicker flew;
They reeled, they set, they crossed, they cleekit,
Till ilka carlin swat and reekit,
And coost her duddies to the wark,
And linket at it in her sark!
Now Tam, O Tam! had they been queans,
Aâ plump and strapping in their teens;
Their sarks, instead oâ creeshie flainen,
Been snaw-white seventeen hunder linen!â
Thir breeks oâ mine, my only pair,
That ance were plush, oâ gude blue hair,
I *** hae giâen them off my hurdies,
For ae blink oâ the bonie burdies!
But withered beldams, auld and droll,
Rigwoodie hags *** spean a foal,
Lowping and flinging on a crummock,
I wonder didna turn thy stomach.
But Tam kenned what was what fuâ brawlie:
âThere was ae winsome ***** and waulieâ,
That night enlisted in the core
(Lang after kenned on Carrick shore;
For mony a beast to dead she shot,
And perished mony a bonie boat,
And shook baith meikle corn and bear,
And kept the country-side in fear);
Her cutty sark, oâ Paisley harn,
That while a lassie she had worn,
In longitude thoâ sorely scanty,
It was her best, and she was vauntie.
Ah! little kenned thy reverend grannie,
That sark she coft for her wee Nannie,
Wiâ twa pund Scots (âtwas aâ her riches),
*** ever graced a dance of witches!
But here my Muse her wing maun cour,
Sic flights are far beyond her power;
To sing how Nannie lap and flang,
(A souple jade she was and strang),
And how Tam stood, like ane bewitched,
And thought his very een enriched;
Even Satan glowered, and fidged fuâ fain,
And hotched and blew wiâ might and main:
Till first ae caper, syne anither,
Tam tint his reason aâ thegither,
And roars out, âWeel done, Cutty-sark!â
And in an instant all was dark:
And scarcely had he Maggie rallied,
When out the hellish legion sallied.
As bees bizz out wiâ angry fyke,
When plundering herds assail their byke;
As open pussieâs mortal foes,
When, pop! she starts before their nose;
As eager runs the market-crowd,
When âCatch the thief!â resounds aloud;
So Maggie runs, the witches follow,
Wiâ mony an eldritch screech and hollow.
Ah, Tam! ah, Tam! thouâll get thy fairin!
In hell theyâll roast thee like a herrin!
In vain thy Kate awaits thy comin!
Kate soon will be a woefuâ woman!
Now, do thy speedy utmost, Meg,
And win the key-stane of the brig;
There at them thou thy tail may toss,
A running stream they dare na cross.
But ere the key-stane she could make,
The fient a tail she had to shake!
For Nannie, far before the rest,
Hard upon noble Maggie prest,
And flew at Tam wiâ furious ettle;
But little wist she Maggieâs mettleâ
Ae spring brought off her master hale,
But left behind her ain grey tail:
The carlin claught her by the ****,
And left poor Maggie scarce a stump.
Now, wha this tale oâ truth shall read,
Ilk man and motherâs son, take heed:
Wheneâer to drink you are inclined,
Or cutty-sarks run in your mind,
Think, ye may buy the joys oâer dear,
Remember Tam oâShanterâs mare.