Digital Tradition Mirror

Hielant Donalie

Hielant Donalie

     1.
     The broon coo's broken the fa'
       An' aiten a' the corn;
     I winna bide or Saiterday,
       For I'll awa' the morn,
     An' follo' Hielan' Donal,
       An' carry's pooder-horn.

     It's ow'r Urie, ow'r Gadie,
       Ow'r Bogie wi' him,
     Up the braes o' Garrochie,
       An' on to Sheelagreen.
     An' I winna bide or Saiterday,
       For I'll awa' the morn,
     An' follo' Hielan' Donal,
       An carry's pooder-horn.

     2.
     The broon coo's broken the fauld,
       An' aiten a' the corn;
     I winna bide ere Saiterday,
       But I'll awa' the morn,
     An' follow Hielan' Donal',
       An' cairry's pooder horn.

     3.
     The blue coo's luppin' the dyke
       And in amon' the corn,
     And oor gudeman's hitten me
       And I'm awa' the morn,
     To follow Hielant Donalie
       And carry his pouther horn.
     ________________________________________________________

     (1) SNQ III.s (Apr. 1890), 173: "an Aberdeenshire ballad
     . . . which, fifty odd years ago [i.e., c. 1840, or
     before], I often heard old Saunders Smith chant, in the
     old House of Hilton.  I have never seen the ballad in
     print, and all that I remember of the old man's song is
     [the above]."  The correspondent speculates about its
     origin--back to the time of Donald of the Isles?
     Sheelagreen: "Is it the farm of that name, near to the
     Glens of Fodland, and Pitmachie?" -- i.e. all the places
     point to Harlaw.  There is some connection with the old
     song of "O'er Bogie", of which but fragments remain; it
     was touched up by Ramsay (1720), and Stenhouse (Illus.,
     162) gives


I will awa wi' my love,

I will awa wi' her;

Tho' a my kin had sworn and said,

I'll o'er Bogie wi' her.

I'll o'er Bogie, o'er Scrogie,

O'er Bogie wi' her;

In spite o' a' my kin has said,

I will awa wi' her.

     To the air SMM also prints (II.176) another song by
     Ramsay, "Well, I agree, ye're sure of me".  The tune
     appears first in Orpheus Caledonius, 1725 (1733, I.104);
     Stewart's Musick, 1725; and after in places like
     Mitchell's Highland Fair (1731), 3 (no. I).
     (2) Greig FSNE cxiii.3, from New Deer.
     (3) Rymour Club Misc. I (1906-11), 188, from Angus, 1860
     [whence Montgomerie SC (1948), 47 (no. 43); Cheape & Sprott
     (1980), 56].
     The cow's high jinks appear also in a rhyme from
Mintlaw, Aberdeenshire (Rymour Club Misc. II [1912-19], 53):
"What will my grannie say When she comes hame the morn?/ The
broon coo's broken oot, And aeten a' the corn!"

MS
APR99

Thanks to Mudcat for the Digital Tradition!