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HISTORICAL NOTES |
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Museum, that Laddie lie near me is by Dr. Blacklock, refers to the first song for the tune in the Museum, beginning, ' Hark, the loud trumpet.' Lady lie near me, in Playford's Dancing Master, 1650, is in the same measure, but there is no resemblance to Oswald's tune except in the rhythm. This English tune served many songs, and was popular about the period of the Restoration. The original seems to be a black-letter ballad, entitled, ' The longing Shepherdess, or Lady lie near me, printed by W. Thackery at the Angel in Duck Lane? Still less resemblance is there to an English tane, Jenny, come tye my cravat, in Apollo's Banquet, 1687. Wherever the original verses are to be discovered, upon which Burns founded his song, they are not in either of the English songs. See No. 101.
No. 143. By Allan stream I chanc'd to rove. Scotish Airs, 1799, 79. 'Written for this work by Robert Burns. Air, Allan Water' One of the Thomson MS. How this pastoral was written in (? August, 1793) is described as follows: ' I walked out yesterday evening with a volume of the Museum in my hand, when turning up Allan Water, " What numbers shall the muse repeat," it appeared to me rather unworthy of so fine an air, and recollecting that it is in your list, I sat and raved under the shade of an old thorn, till I wrote one to suit the measure. I may be wrong, but I think it is not in my worst style. You must know that in Ramsay's Tea- Table Miscellany, where the modern song first appeared, the ancient name of the tune, Allan says, is Allan Water, or, My love Annie's very bonie. This last has certainly been a line of the original song; so I took up the idea, and, as you see, have introduced the line in its place, which I presume it formerly occupied; though I give you a choosing line if it should not hit the cut of your fancy.'
The music of Allan Water is in Blaikie's MS., 1692 ; Atkinson's MS., 1694 ; Original Scotch Tunes, 1700; Sinklers MS., 1710; Caledonian Pocket Companion, 1752, iv. sj; McGibbon's Scots Tunes, 1742, 34 ; and with verses in Orpheus Caledonius, 1733, No. 28; Scots Musical Museum, 1787, No. 4}, and Dale's Scotch Songs, 1794, ii. 72. 'This Allan Water, which the composer of the music has honoured with the name of the air, I have been told, is Allan Water, in Strathallan' {Interleaved Museum).
H"o. 144. I fee'd a man at Martinmas. Scots Musical Museum, 1792, No. J94, entitled 0 can ye labour lea. The MS. is in the British Museum. An amended version of an equivocal rustic song in the Merry Muses, which differs slightly from that here printed. Cromek, in Select Scotish Songs, 1810, ii. 40, remarks: ' This song has long been known among the inhabitants of Nithsdale and Galloway, where it is a great favourite.'
This is the tune which George Thomson copied from the Scots Musical Museum, and printed for the first time in 1799 as the melody of Burns's Auld lang syne. See Song No. 234. ou<C 151,
No. 145. As down the burn they took their way. Currie, Works, 1800, iv. iij. Written at the request of Thomson, to replace a stanza in a song by William Crawford, beginning, ' When trees did bud,' originally printed in the Tea-Table Miscellany, 1724. Burns at first declined to touch the song, but Thomson prevailed, with the unsuccessful result in the text. In Select Melodies, 1822, I'll. 11, Thomson replaced Burns's stanza by some vapid lines of his own; as he said Burns ' did not bring the son*g to the desirable conclusion.'
The tune, with Crawford's verses, is in the Orpheus Caledonius, 1725, No. jo; in Bremner's Scots Songs, 1757, 27; the Perth Musical Miscellany, 1786,1, and the Scots Musical Museum, 1787, No. 74. The tune alone is in the Caledonian Pocket Companion, 1752, iv. 18, and McGibbon's Scots Tunes, 1742, jj. According to a tradition related by Riddell in the Interleaved Museum, David Maigh, a keeper of the hounds of the Laird of Riddell in Tweeddale, was the composer. Tradition here is'probably wrong. |
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