poor mailie's elegy

    lament in rhyme, lament in prose,

    wi' saut tears trickling down your nose;

    our bardie's fate is at a close,

    past a' remead!

    the last, sad cape-stane o' his woes;

    poor mailie's dead!

    it's no the loss o' warl's gear,

    that could sae bitter draw the tear,

    or mak our bardie, dowie, wear

    the mourning weed:

    he's lost a friend an' neebor dear

    in mailie dead.

    thro' a' the town she trotted by him;

    a lang half-mile she could descry him;

    wi' kindly bleat, when she did spy him,

    she ran wi' speed:

    a friend mair faithfu' ne'er cam nigh him,

    than mailie dead.

    i wat she was a sheep o' sense,

    an' could behave hersel' wi' mense:

    i'll say't, she never brak a fence,

    thro' thievish greed.

    our bardie, lanely, keeps the spence

    sin' mailie's dead.

    or, if he wanders up the howe,

    her living image in her yowe

    comes bleating till him, owre the knowe,

    for bits o' bread;

    an' down the briny pearls rowe

    for mailie dead.

    she was nae get o' moorland tips,

    wi' tauted ket, an' hairy hips;

    for her forbears were brought in ships,

    frae 'yont the tweed.

    a bonier fleesh ne'er cross'd the clips

    than mailie's dead.

    wae worth the man wha first did shape

    that vile, wanchancie thing—a raip!

    it maks guid fellows girn an' gape,

    wi' chokin dread;

    an' robin's bonnet wave wi' crape

    for mailie dead.

    o, a' ye bards on bonie doon!

    an' wha on ayr your chanters tune!

    come, join the melancholious croon

    o' robin's reed!

    his heart will never get aboon—

    his mailie's dead!