 sj |
||
|
||
| ||||||
|
Share
YOUNG LASSIE AND THE AULD MAN 0 Kitty, dear Kitty, I'll tell you what grieves me, And for to advise me do all that you can, If ye could relieve me a present I'll give you— What can a young lassie do wi' an auld man? I canna get sleeping for sighing and weeping, What shall I do, Kitty ? Oh, here, take my fan: My mind is sae crazy, I'm dull and uneasy, I am sae perplex’d wi' a crazy auld man. My mither she teazes me morning and evening, My aunty she vexes me a' the day lang To marry the carle because o' his siller— But what can a lassie do wi' an auld man? His heart it is cauld, within dull an' hollow, The hale o' his carcase is a' skin .in' bane, For him an' his money I carena a penny— ' What can a young lassie do wi' an auld man? My titty, the gypsy, wha wudna miscall her? On me takes nae pity, but joins wi' the clan, And says I may never get sic a gude offer— But what can a lassie do wi' an auld man ? Sweethearts I've got mony, but she hasna ony, Sae well's I can dive in the heart o' her plan, Because she's negleckit, my peace she has wreckit, And plagues me to marry a doited auld man. They keep me at hame frae the dance and the market, Because I am some years younger than Anne, The tawpie ; than Dawty,—an' they, for to please her, Would sell a young lassie unto an auld man. The rose in its splendor shall blaw in December, The corbie an’ craw turn white as the swan, The owl it shall sing like the linnet in spring, Before that I marry a crazy auld man. In the little-known third part of C. K. Sharpe's _A Ballad Book,_ the following song appears (without melody) on pages 178-180 in the William Blackwood edition of 1880 publi shed in Edinburgh Said to be written by Miss Jean Allardyce of Pittenweem to her friend, Miss Kath erine Gordon of Wardass, 1714. Assuming the date is to be trusted, this defiant song would apparently be the in spiration for Burn's sardonic "What Can a Young Lassie Do wi' an Auld Man?" (A copy is in the _Scots Musical Museum, of 1787,_ No. 316.) The catch -- isn't there always one -- is this: Dick's _Notes on Scottish Songs by Robert Burns, No. 197, notes there is a blackletter broadside entitled "The Young Woman's Complaint, or a caveat to all maids to have a care how they be married to old men." It 's presumably OLDER tune is "What Should a Young Woman Do with an Old Man," or "The Tyrant." Claude Simpson has located a broadside i n which the tune "What Should a Young Woman Do with an Old Man" is also titled "Digby's Farewell. " Trouble is that I cannot see much of a relationship between Burns' melody in th e _Museum_ (and in Ritson's _Scottish Ballads, II) and the "Digby" tunes in Simoson. @aging @courtship filename[ AULDMAN EC Feb07 |
|
