"It's weet wi' dew, and will get rain; And I'll get gowns when it is gane; Sae ye may gang the gate ye cam', And tell it to your dawtie."

The guilt appeared in Jamie's cheek: He cried, "O cruel maid, but sweet, If I could gang anither gate,

I ne'er could meet my dawtie."

The lasses fast frae him they flew,
And left poor Jamie sair to rue
That ever Maggie's face he knew,
Or yet ca'ed Bess a gawkie.

As they gaed owre the muir they sang,
The hills and dales wi' echo rang,

The hills and dales wi' echo rang,

JOHN EWEN.

1741-1821.

A native of Montrose, and the son, it is said, of a tinker, John Ewen himself for a time followed the trade of a packman. In 1760 he settled in Aberdeen as a hardware merchant, and so improved his fortune by industry and marriage that at his death he left a fortune of £15,000. An obituary in the Scots Magazine of the time paid a highly flattering tribute to his usefulness, respectability, and intelligence, and praised him especially for his exertions in favour of charitable institutions as well as in cases of private distress. Yet, because his daughter and only child had married otherwise than he desired, he left his entire fortune to found a college for orphans. After much litigation, in which the character of Ewen came out in rather unenviable light, the will was set aside by the House of Lords, the reason assigned being the testator's lack of precision in stating both the amount to be expended on the hospital, and the number of poor boys to be benefited.

In the light of such a revelation it is little to be wondered at that the authenticity of Ewen's only song, that "exquisite, artless embodiment of the affection of the mother and the wife,' "The Boatie Rows," should be challenged by Buchan, the ballad collector. The latter, however, altogether failed to make out a case, Ewen indeed having been well known in Aberdeen as a man of musical talent and lyric taste; and the song remains accordingly an outstanding evidence of the frequent paradox of human nature. "The Boatie Rows was first assigned to John Ewen by Burns, who stated it to be, in his opinion, "nearly equal to 'There's nae Luck about the House.""

THE BOATIE ROWS.

O WEEL may the boatie row,
And better may it speed;

And liesome may the boatie row

That wins the bairnies' bread!

I pleasant.

I half-peck wooden measure.

The boatie rows, the boatie rows,
The boatie rows fu' weel;

And meikle luck attend the boat,
The murlain1 and the creel!

I cuist my line in Largo Bay,
And fishes I caught nine;
There's three to boil, and three to fry,
And three to bait the line.
The boatie rows, the boatie rows,
The boatie rows indeed;

And weel may the boatie row
That wins my bairnies' bread.

O weel may the boatie row
That fills a heavy creel,
And cleeds us a' frae tap to tae,

And buys our parritch meal!
The boatie rows, the boatie rows,
The boatie rows indeed,

And happy be the lot of a'

That wish the boatie speed!

When Jamie vowed he wad be mine,
And won frae me my heart,
O meikle lighter grew my creel;
He swore we'd never part.
The boatie rows, the boatie rows,
The boatie rows fu' weel;
And meikle lighter is the load

When love bears up the creel.

My kertch I put upon my head,
And dressed mysel' fu' braw;
But dowie, dowie was my heart

When Jamie gaed awa'.
But weel may the boatie row,

And lucky be her part;

And lightsome be the lassie's care,
That yields an honest heart!

When Sandy, Jock, and Janetie,

Are up, and gotten lear1,

They'll help to gar the boatie row,

And lighten a' our care.

The boatie rows, the boatie rows,

The boatie rows fu' weel;

And lightsome be her heart that bears

The murlain and the creel!

When we are auld, and sair bowed down,

And hirplin' at the door,

They'll row to keep us dry and warm,

As we did them before.

Then weel may the boatie row,

And better may it speed,

And happy be the lot of a'

That wish the boatie speed!

I learning.

2 hobbling.

I Drive the ewes.

ISOBEL PAGAN.

1741-1821.

Ill-favoured and deformed in person, Isobel or Tibbie Pagan was no less famed for her sarcastic wit than for her vocal powers. Her hovel, near Muirkirk, in Ayrshire, where most of her dissolute days were spent, and where she died, was a favourite houf of the gentlemen of the neighbourhood, who, while they enjoyed her smuggled whiskey, made merry over her shafts of humour and wit, and took pleasure in hearing her sing. Though so near a neighbour, Burns curiously was not aware that she was the author of "Ca' the yowes to the knowes," which he stated in his notes to Johnson's Museum to be "in the true Scottish taste." Possibly he did not even know of her existence. About the year 1805 there was published at Glasgow under her name "A Collection of Songs and Poems," most of them little more than doggerel. An account of her irregular and eccentric life, with one or two of her compositions, is given in "The Ayrshire Contemporaries of Burns," Edin. 1840.

Of her fine song as here printed, the final verse is from the pen of Burns himself. Another set of words with the same title was also written by Burns.

CA' THE YOWES TO THE

KNOWES.

CA' the yowes1 to the knowes—

Ca' them whare the heather grows―

Ca' them whare the burnie rows,

My bonnie dearie !