The following recitativo is written in a stanza form called Standard Habbie after a poem made to one Habbie Simpson, piper of Kilbarchan, by Sir Robert Sempill of Beltrees, although the form has an older ancestry.
Nowadays it is often called the Burns Stanza from Burns extensive use of it. Burns was not given to experiment with verse form, he preferred to use old forms to write new poems.
Recitavo
A pigmy scraper, wi' his fiddle
Wha used at trysts and fairs to driddle
Her strappin' limb and gaucy middle
(He reached na higher)
Had hol'd his heartie like a riddle
And blawn't on fire
Wi' hand on haunch, and upward e'e
He crooned his gamut, one, two, three
Then in an arioso key
The wee Apollo
Set off wi' allegretto glee
His giga solo
Though Burns was an expert at fitting words to a tune, he was modest enough about his formal musical education, but he seems to have studied it in some small degree, as the musical terms indicate. Apollo, like Boreas, is dropped into a Scots context, and the small musician has no mean opinion of his abilities to entertain, while the chorus is a reference to his sexual expertise.
The tripping dance of the tune to which the words are set is appropriate to the kirns and weddings at which he assures his love they will be welcome. There is an air of genteel courtesy about his wooing.
AIR Tune Whistle owre the lave o't
Let me ryke up to dight that tear
And go wi' me and be my dear
And then your every care and fear
May whistle owre the lave o't
CHORUS
I am a fiddler to my trade
And a' the tunes that e'er I played
The sweetest still to wife or maid
Was whistle owre the lave o't
At kirns and weddings we'se be there
And oh! sae nicely's we will fare
We'll bouse about till Daddie Care
Sings whistle owre the lave o't
Sae merrily the banes we'll pyke
And sun oursel's about the dyke
And at our leisure, when ye like
We'll whistle owre the lave o't
But bless me wi' your heaven o' charms
And while I kittle hair on thairms
Hunger, cauld, and a' sic harms
May whistle owre the lave o't
This air of genteel courtesy about his wooing is roughly brushed aside by the bullying caird, whose sanguinary threat to spleet him like a pliver ridicules the poor fiddler's tender body and lack of inches.
The roostiness of the rapier adds a gruesome overtone to the pliver image. The fiddler begs for mercy and salves his pride by snirtling in his sleeve at the coarse directness of the tinker's approach.
Recitavo
Her charms had struck a sturdy caird
As weel as poor gut-scraper
He tak's the fiddler by the beard
And draws a rusty rapier
He swore by a' was swearing worth
To speet him like a pliver
Unless he wad from that time forth
Relinquish her for ever
Wi' ghastly e'e, poor Tweedle-dee
Upon his hunkers bended
And prayed for grace wi' ruefu' face
And sae the quarrel ended
But though his little heart did grieve
When round the tinkler prest her
He feigned to snirtle in his sleeve
When thus the caird addressed her
The tinker has a philistine contempt for the fiddler's music. Food, drink and sex are his concerns, says he. We tend to forget that this is exactly what the fiddler said, for all his airs and graces. He gets with his fiddle what the caird gets with his hammer.
The mender of pots and pans gives us a song which could be sung while clouting the caudron, and again there is a proliferation of end rhymes and internal rhymes. This song has a distinctly Scottish flavour, but the sprinkling of Scots words is fairly light.
Why this light sprinkling of Scottish lexis? One of the reasons is that the rhymes would not work so well if it were wholly in Scots. Burns and many other Scots poets sometimes cheat when a standard English rhyme makes a better agreement, the use of only a scattering of Scots opens the door to a wider supply of rhymes.
In Ayrshire Scots, the first three lines of the Caird's song would be - My bonie lass, I wark in bress a tinkler is my station, I've trevellt roon aw Christian grunn. The loss of agreement in the rhymes is obvious. Conversely, stowp and houpe make a better rhyme than standard English stoup and hope. Gold and enrolled cannot be replaced by gowd and enrow'd (like ow in cow) because Scots do not enrow, they list (as appears later in the Recitativo).
TUNE Air Clout the Cauldron
My bonie lass, I work in brass
A tinkler is my station
I've travelled round all Christian ground
In this my occupation
I've ta'en the gold, I've been enrolled
In many a noble squadron
But vain they searched, when off I marched
To go and clout the caudron
I've ta'en the gold etc.
Despise that shrimp, that withered imp
Wi' a' his noise and cap'rin'
And tak' a share wi' those that bear
The budget and the apron
And by that stoup, my faith and houp
And by that dear Kilbagie
Whisky made at Kilbagie Distillery, in Clackmannanshire
If e'er you want, or meet wi' scant
May I ne'er weet my craigie!
And by that stoup, etc.
The tinker, despite his lack of courtly manners, gets his way, and the fiddler finds solace in another lady. We are told that he raked her fore and aft ahint the chicken cavie.
What would the prim Mrs. Riddel make of that, one wonders, and perhaps Robert wondered too, because if he is to be believed, he thought so little of it that he forgot it's very existence.
Cupid, Homer and Bacchus appear in the heavily Scots Recitativo, it is quite noticeable that the classical references appear in the most heavily Scots areas of the Cantata. Castalia, Helicon and the Muses are found in the very Scots Poet's Song and not in the standard English Poet's Finale. The modern metropolitan affectation that the sliding diphthongs and intrusive liaisons of Cockney variants of English are the only reputable way to speak that language, and the attitude that there are no other languages on the island despite the persistence of Welsh, Gaelic and Scots, is an irritant to many educated people outside that Pale in our own day.
Burns was irritated by precisely the same assumptions. He is making the point that Scots is not a language of provincial dunces, and that it is not the many-tongued Scot who is parochial, but his linguistic detractors. Why else should he bother to interpose sections of standard English verse in Tam o'Shanter? It is absurd to assume that he could not have written it all in Scots (and might well have preferred to), those who do not think that he was demonstrating his ability in their language as well as his own are obliged to supply another reason for the poet's linguistic choices.
Recitavo
The caird prevailed - the unblushing fair
In his embraces sunk
Partly wi' love o'ercome sae sair
And partly she was drunk
Sir Violino, with an air
That showed a man of spunk
Wished unison between the pair
And made the bottle clunk
To their health that night!
But hurchin Cupid shot a shaft
That played a dame a shavie
The fiddler raked her fore and aft
Ahint the chicken cavie
Her lord, a wight o' Homer's craft
Though limping wi' the spavie
He hirpled up, and lap like daft
And shored them Dainty Davie
O' boot that night
He was a care-defying blade
As ever Bacchus listed
Though Fortune sair upon him laid
His heart she ever miss'd it
He had nae wish but - to be glad
Nor want but - when he thirsted
He hated nought but - to be sad
And thus the Muse suggested
His sang that night
The Poet's Song is no mask, but naked Burns. It is the verse of a man who knows his talent and is exasperated by his lack of recognition. He is a Bard of no regard wi gentle folks an' a' that.
In 1793, at the time of the letter to Thomson, that was no longer true, but the Cantata was written before the Kilmarnock Edition. It is sometimes said that his slighting references to the Muses' stank, Castalia's burn and Helicon are a complaint about his lack of learning. But if all those who cannot, or have forgotten how to, read the Greek and Latin classics in the original tongues are to be classified as unlearned,then there are very few learned people in the world. Despite his little Latin and less Greek, it would be a bold person who called Shakespeare unlearned. It is much more likely that Burns is emphasising a point that he has already made excellently well that beggars are as good a subject for poetry as any other, that poetry written by ordinary men about the ragged underdog is better stuff than the classical maundering of poetasters.
TUNE Air For a' that
I am a bard of no regard
Wi' gentle folks, and a' that
But Homer-like, the glowrin' byke
Frae town to town I draw that
CHORUS
For a' that, and a' that
And twice as muckle's a' that
I've lost but ane, I've twa behin'
I've wife eneugh for a' that
I never drank the Muses' stank
Castalia's burn, and a' that
But there it streams, and richly reams
My Helicon I ca' that
For a' that, etc.
Great love I bear to a' the fair
Their humble slave, and a' that
But lordly will, I hold it still
A mortal sin to thraw that
For a' that, etc.
In raptures sweet, this hour we meet
Wi' mutual love, and a' that
But for how lang the flie may stang
Let inclination law that
For a' that, etc.
Their tricks and craft have put me daft
They've ta'en me in, and a' that
But clear your decks, and here's - The Sex!
I like the jads for a' that
For a' that, and a' that
And twice as muckle's a' that
My dearest bluid to do them gude
They're welcome till't for a' that
Recitavo
So sang the bard - and Nansie's wa's
Shook with a thunder of applause
Re-echoed from each mouth
They toomed their pocks, and pawned their duds
They scarcely left to co'er their fuds
To quench their lowin' drouth
Then owre again, the jovial thrang
The poet did request
To loose his pack and wale a sang
A ballad o' the best
He rising, rejoicing
Between his twa Deborahs
Looks round him, and found them
Impatient for the chorus
The profligate duke's song in Rigoletto (written seventy years later), might almost be a paraphrase of this Poet's Song, and were it not that the characters are tatterdemalions rather than noblemen, the Poet's Finale sounds as if it had been written as an anthem for the Abbey of Thelema (or perhaps Medmenham).
AIR Tune Jolly Mortals, fill your Glasses
See! the smoking bowl before us
Mark our jovial ragged ring!
Round and round take up the chorus
And in raptures let us sing
CHORUS
A fig for those by law protected!
Liberty's a glorious feast!
Courts for cowards were erected
Churches built to please the priest
What is title? what is treasure?
What is reputation's care?
If we lead a life of pleasure
'Tis no matter how or where!
A fig, etc.
With the ready trick and fable
Round we wander all the day
And at night, in barn or stable
Hug our doxies on the hay
A fig, etc.
Does the train-attended carriage
Through the country lighter rove?
Does the sober bed of marriage
Witness brighter scenes of love?
A fig, etc.
Life is all a variorum
We regard not how it goes
Let them cant about decorum
Who have characters to lose!
A fig, etc.
Here's to budgets, bags, and wallets!
Here's to all the wandering train!
Here's our ragged brats and callets!
One and all cry out - Amen!
A fig etc.
Remember Gauger Burns, emerging from the Inquiry with a sigh of relief, perhaps he has had a hint of future promotion, if he keeps his nose clean. Think of him picking up a letter of enquiry from the egregious Thomson; consider how he might have reflected on the Cantata, and put yourself in his shoes.
A man has a living to earn, and poetry will scarcely provide enough for Jean and the bairns. Yon Inquiry was a kittle business. Better not have Thomson stirring up a wasps' byke again. Feign ignorance.
Let us give thanks, however, that Love and Liberty survived.
In March 1784, he wrote regarding such sleight-of-hand vagabonds as he depicted in the foregoing cantata. I have often observed, in the course of my experience of human life, that every man, even the worst, has something good about him, though very often nothing else than a happy temperament of constitution inclining him to this or that virtue. For this reason I have often courted the acquaintance of that part of mankind commonly known by the ordinary phrase of blackguards, sometimes farther than was consistent with the safety of my character. Though disgraced by follies, nay, sometimes stained with guilt, I have yet found among them, not a few instances, some of the noblest virtues - magnanimity, generosity, disinterested friendship, and even modesty.
| 