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viii. JACOBITE |
471 |
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and in the Scottish Minstrel, 1821, i. 22, is a combination of Burns and Nairne, which is stated in the Index to be by Burns, The original publication of the tone is in the Museum with the verses, but it contains phrases of an older tune.
TTo. 299. The lovely lass of Inverness. Scots Musical Museum, 1796, No. 401, signed ' B.' Select Melodies, 1823, v. iy. 'Mr. Burns's old words' {Museum -MS. Lists). The MS. is in the British Musenm. All but the opening four lines are by Burns, and form one of his best songs on a subject which deeply interested him. The Battle of Culloden, or Drumossie Moor, fought on April 16, 1746, finished the career of Charles Edward Stuart in Scotland. William, Duke of Cumberland, the Commander of the government army, was the most detested name in Scotland for half a century, and the subject of the strongest invective in prose and verse. Cromek, in Nithsdale and Galloway Song, 1810, published Cumberland and Murray's descent into Hell, reprinted in Hogg's Jacobite Relics, 1821, ii. ipp. It is unsurpassed for brutal sarcasm, and I suspect was written either by Hogg or Cunningham. Burns visited the field of Culloden in 1787, and in his diary of the Highland tour he has recorded his reflections on the final disaster of the Stuarts.
It may be remarked here that it was owing to the Rebellion that God save the king was first publicly performed and recognized as a national air. In September, 1745, it was sung in chorus from the stage of the London theatres, and the Duke of Cumberland was honoured with a complete stanza :—
' O, grant that Cumberland May, by his mighty hand,
Victory bring; May he sedition hush, And like a torrent rush, Rebellious hearts to crush,
God save the king.'
The news of the defeat at Culloden arrived at Covent Garden theatre during a performance, which was interrupted while the actors sung the anthem.
The tune The lovely lass of Inverness, originally published in 1740, is the composition of James Oswald, and is in the Caledonian Pocket Companion, 1743, i. p. Johnson, of the Scots Musical Museum, originally intended it for a song beginning ' Upon the flowery banks of Tweed,' but Burns directed his own song for it, and so it was printed.
No. 300. Whare hae ye been sae braw, lad P Scots Musical Museum, 1790, No. 292, signed ' Z,'entitled Killiecrankie. There is nothing directly connecting Burns with this song. The note in the Interleaved Museum, written by Robert Riddell, is only historical. Stenhouse says, ' The chorus is old. The rest of it, beginning Whare hae ye been sae braw, lad, was written in 1789 by Burns on purpose for the Museum' {Illustrations, p. 287). No one has disputed this statement. In the Highland tour, Burns passed through Killiecrankie on August 31, 1787.
Killiecrankie is represented as a malignant song in Scotch Presbyterian Eloquence Displayed, a contemporary publication. The battle took place oh July 27, 1689, in the celebrated pass which Burton, the historian, describes as the most picturesque of Scottish battlefields. Here John Claverhouse, the darling of the Cavaliers and the accursed of the Covenanters, was killed. The Highlanders won, but the loss of Claverhouse (' Clavers got a clankie, O ') and Haliburton, of Pitcur, outweighed the gain, and the cause of James VII declined from that time.
The tune An'ye had been where I hae been is a different melody from Killiecrankie, No. 2}6 supra, to which Burns drew the attention of Johnson. The music is in McGibbon's Scots Tunes, 1755, ,74 ; in the Caledonian Pocket Companion, 1758, ix. 18; Aird's Airs, 1782, ii. N0./7. The title is clearly part of the words |
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