"Heather on the Moor" is a new title for an old Scots song somewhat altered. The song is in 'The Scots Musical Museum', IV, #328 (1792), as "O'er the moor amang the heather". The song was taken to be by a Jean Glover (by Robert Burns), but she was born in 1758, and the attribution is now very doubtful. The tune seems to have first been printed in P. Thompson's 'Twenty Four Country Dances for the Year 1758' as "In the Moor among the Heather" and two years later in Bremner's 'Reels' as "O'er the moor among the heather". The latter copy can be found reprinted as #1569 in 'Sources of Irish Traditional Music', I, 1998. Song, tune, and notes (with belief that Burns slightly revised the text) are in James Dick's 'The Songs of Robert Burns', #356.

Delia Murphy (Mrs. Walter Kiernan) sang the Irish version on an LP recording ('The Queen of Connemara', Irish 35002) about 1960. Her title for it was "Down the Moor".

The song is Roud #375 in Steve Roud's folks song index. Only one Irish version is listed, in Journal of the Irish Folk Song Society. Most traditional versions are Scots, and the song in SMM was reprinted in songbooks and chapbooks. Search on 'muir' for copies of a slightly different version on the Bodley Ballads website.

[From SMM, IV, #328, 1792.]

O'er the moor amang the heather

Comin thro' the craigs o' Kyle,
Amang the bony blooming heather,
There I met a bonie lassie
Keeping a' her yowes the-gether.
[Cho] O'er the moor amang the heather,
O'er the moor amang the heather,
There I met a bonie lassie
keeping a' her yowes the_gether.

Says I my dear whare is thy hame,
In moor, or dale, pray tell me whether,
She says, I tent thae fleecy flocks
That feed amang the blooming heather
Cho: O'er the moor, &c.
O'er the moor, &c.
She say, I tent the fleecy flocks
That feed amang the blooming heather.

We laid us down upon a bank,
Sae warm and sunny was the weather,
She left her flocks at large to rove,
Amang the bonie blooming heather.
Cho: O'er the moor, &c.
O'er the moor, &c.
She left her flocks at large to rove,
Amang the bonie blooming heather.

While thus we lay she sang a sang,
Till echo rang a mile and farther,
And ay the burden o' the sang
Was, o'er the moor amang the heather.
Cho: O'er the moor, &c.
O'er the moor, &c.
And ay the burden o' the sang
Was, o'er the moor amang the heather.

She charm'd my heart, and ay sinsyne
I could na think on ony ither:
By sea and sky! she shall be mine!
The bonie lass amang the heather.
Cho: O'er the moor, &c.
O'er the moor, &c.
By sea and sky, she shall be mine,
The bonie lass amang the heather.