Willie, Willie
WILLIE'S LYKE-WAKE—A
[_]
Kinloch's MSS, i, 53, from the recitation of Mary Barr,
Lesmahagow, aged upwards of seventy. May, 1827.
1
‘Willie, Willie, I'll learn you a wile,’
And the sun shines over the valleys and a'
‘How this pretty fair maid ye may beguile.’
Amang the blue flowrs and the yellow and a'
2
‘Ye maun lie doun just as ye were dead,
And tak your winding-sheet around your head.
3
‘Ye maun gie the bellman his bell-groat,
To ring your dead-bell at your lover's yett.’
4
He lay doun just as he war dead,
And took his winding-sheet round his head.
5
He gied the bellman his bell-groat,
To ring his dead-bell at his lover's yett.
6
‘O wha is this that is dead, I hear?’
‘O wha but Willie that loed ye sae dear.’
7
She is to her father's chamber gone,
And on her knees she's fallen down.
8
‘O father, O father, ye maun grant me this;
I hope that ye will na tak it amiss.
9
‘That I to Willie's burial should go;
For he is dead, full well I do know.’
10
‘Ye'll tak your seven bauld brethren wi thee,
And to Willie's burial straucht go ye.’
11
It's whan she cam to the outmost yett,
She made the silver fly round for his sake.
12
It's whan she cam to the inmost yett,
She made the red gowd fly round for his sake.
13
As she walked frae the court to the parlour there,
The pretty corpse syne began for to steer.
14
He took her by the waist sae neat and sae sma,
And threw her atween him and the wa.
15
‘O Willie, O Willie, let me alane this nicht,
O let me alane till we're wedded richt.’
16
‘Ye cam unto me baith sae meek and mild,
But I'll mak ye gae hame a wedded wife wi child.’
