<style> <!-- /* Font Definitions */ @font-face {font-family:Times; panose-1:2 0 5 0 0 0 0 0 0 0; mso-font-charset:0; mso-generic-font-family:auto; mso-font-pitch:variable; mso-font-signature:3 0 0 0 1 0;} @font-face {font-family:Cambria; panose-1:0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0; mso-font-alt:"Times New Roman"; mso-font-charset:77; mso-generic-font-family:roman; mso-font-format:other; mso-font-pitch:auto; mso-font-signature:3 0 0 0 1 0;} /* Style Definitions */ p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal {mso-style-parent:""; margin-top:0in; margin-right:0in; margin-bottom:10.0pt; margin-left:0in; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:12.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-ascii-font-family:Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:Cambria; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family:Cambria; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;} p {margin-top:0in; margin-right:0in; margin-bottom:10.0pt; margin-left:0in; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-ascii-font-family:Times; mso-fareast-font-family:Cambria; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family:Times; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman";}size:8.5in 11.0in; margin:1.0in 1.25in 1.0in 1.25in; mso-header-margin:.5in; mso-footer-margin:.5in; mso-paper-source:0;} div.Section1 {page:Secti</style>"Now westlin winds and slaught'ring guns" was the first song that Robert Burns ever wrote. He was seventeen years old at the time. His father had sent him off to a summer school on the Carrick Border (https://duckduckgo.com/?q=%22Carrick+Border%22+%2C+Robert+Burns&t=osx&ia=web) to receive a few lessons in higher math. Ah, but he was distracted !
Burns was born in a humble peasant croft in 1759, in Alloway, Ayreshire, Scotland. His father, whose family had been both landed and cultured in Aberdeenshire before the Scottish Rebellion of 1745, had had to go into hiding in the wake of that event, and thus, lived in diminished social circumstances.
There were only about eight books on the bookshelf in the Croft (http://blog.dlg.galileo.usg.edu/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/robtburnscottage.jpg)<style> <!-- /* Font Definitions */ @font-face {font-family:Times; panose-1:2 0 5 0 0 0 0 0 0 0; mso-font-charset:0; mso-generic-font-family:auto; mso-font-pitch:variable; mso-font-signature:3 0 0 0 1 0;} @font-face {font-family:Cambria; panose-1:0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0; mso-font-alt:"Times New Roman"; mso-font-charset:77; mso-generic-font-family:roman; mso-font-format:other; mso-font-pitch:auto; mso-font-signature:3 0 0 0 1 0;} /* Style Definitions */ p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal {mso-style-parent:""; margin-top:0in; margin-right:0in; margin-bottom:10.0pt; margin-left:0in; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:12.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-ascii-font-family:Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:Cambria; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family:Cambria; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;}size:8.5in 11.0in; margin:1.0in 1.25in 1.0in 1.25in; mso-header-margin:.5in; mso-footer-margin:.5in; mso-paper-source:0;} div.Section1 {page:Section1;}</style> where Burns spent his childhood. Yet he mastered them all. One of the books, was Buffon's Natural History (http:// https://duckduckgo.com/?q=Buffon%2C+%22natural+history%22+%2C+birds&t=osx&iax=images&ia=images). See how familiar Burns was with the birds (http:// https://i.pinimg.com/originals/3d/a8/24/3da824ca17ce1d2d86f7e80a64622408.jpg) whose pictures he had studied in books !
Abraham Lincoln, who was born almost exactly fifty years after Robert Burns, in 1809, also grew up in humble circumstances - in a Log Cabin (https://s3.amazonaws.com/s3.timetoast.com/public/uploads/photos/11385573/preshome1.jpeg?1517962871), on the frontier in Kentucky. His father also only had about eight books on the shelf in the cabin. Like Burns, Lincoln studied and mastered them all. One of the books that Abe read when he was young was a book of the Poems of Robert Burns.
Mayacaman
08-19-2020, 10:52 AM
Of a' the airts the wind can blaw
50047
Of a' the airts the wind can blaw, I dearly lo’e the west
For there the bonnie lassie lives, the lassie I lo'e best
There wild-woods grow, and rivers row, and mony a hill between
But day and night my fancy's flight is ever wi' my Jean
Song, with
Pianoforte (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=biKgb0hx55Q)
Cache, Sung by
Various Artists (https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=I%27ll+Meet+Thee+On+The+Lea+Rig)
Note:
Robert Burns, although he was quite articulate and accomplished in "the King's English" (London English, derived from the Southern, predominantly Saxon dialect) wrote Poetry and composed Songs in the North Anglian dialect (https://duckduckgo.com/?q=%22North+Anglian+dialect%22&t=osx&ia=web), the dialect of the Commons in the eighteenth century in Ayresire (https://duckduckgo.com/?q=burns+country+scotland&t=osx&iax=images&ia=images), his home County in Western Lowland Scotland. You may click on the links in order to see the translation from North Anglian into English.
Mayacaman
09-12-2020, 12:01 PM
O Logan, sweetly didst thou glide
50183
O Logan, sweetly didst thou glide
That day I was my Willie's bride,
And years sin syne hae o'er us run
Like Logan to the simmer sun.
But now thy flowery banks appear
Like drumlie winter, dark and drear,
While my dear lad maun face his faes
Farm far frae me and Logan braes.
Again the merry month of May
Has made our hills and vallies gay;
The birds rejoice in leafy bowers
The bees hum round the breathing flowers;
Blythe Morning lifts his rosy eye,
And Evening's tears are tears o' joy:
My soul delightless a' surveys,
While Willie's far frae Logan braes.
Within yon milk-white hawthorn bush,
Amang her nestlings sits the thrush:
Her faithfu' mate will share her toil,
Or wi' his song her cares beguile.
But I wi' my sweet nurslings here,
Nae mate to help, nae mate to cheer,
Pass widow'd nights and joyless days,
While Willie's far frae Logan braes.
O, wae upon you, Men o' State,
That brethren rouse in deadly hate
As ye make monie a fond heart mourn,
Sae may it on your heads return!
Ye mindna' mid your cruel joy
The widow's tears, the orphan's cries;
But soon may peace bring happy days,
And Willie hame to Logan braes.
Note :
As far as I can tell, this was the first Anti-War / Protest Song ever written.
Sung by Jean Redpath, Arrangement by Serge Hovey (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BXOqZgrOV_o)