This is the early traditional Scottish text 'Barbara Allan'- Child Version C; from Motherwell's Manuscript, p. 288; from Mrs. Duff, Kilbirnie, February 9, 1825.

1    It fell about the Lammas time,
When the woods grow green and yellow,
There came a wooer out of the West
A wooing to Barbara Allan.

2    'It is not for your bonny face,
Nor for your beauty bonny,
But it is all for your tocher good
I come so far about ye.'

3    'If it be not for my comely face,
Nor for my beauty bonnie,
My tocher good ye'll never get paid
Down on the board before ye.'

4    'O will ye go to the Highland hills,
To see my white corn growing?
Or will ye go to the river-side,
To see my boats a rowing?'

5    O he's awa, and awa he's gone,
And death's within him dealing,
And it is all for the sake of her,
His bonnie Barbara Allan.

6    O he sent his man unto the house,
Where that she was a dwelling:
'O you must come my master to see,
If you be Barbara Allan.'

7    So slowly aye as she put on,
And so stoutly as she gaed till him,
And so slowly as she could say,
'I think, young man, you're lying.'

8    'O I am lying in my bed,
And death within me dwelling;
And it is all for the love of thee,
My bonny Barbara Allan.'

9    She was not ae mile frae the town,
Till she heard the dead-bell ringing:
'Och hone, oh hone, he's dead and gone,
For the love of Barbara Allan!'

This version is important for the reference in stanzas 2 and 3 of the "toucher good" which Charles Kirkpatrick Sharpe commented upon and also Child who mentioned Buchan's 41 verse version. Sharpe also mentions the "seven ships" which will be found in early print versions in the US before 1850.

Richie