“Wha’ll buy my caller herrin’? They’re bonnie fish and halesome farin’. Wha’ll buy my caller herrin’, New drawn frae the Forth? When ye were sleepin’ on your pillows, Dreamed ye aught o’ our puir fellows, Darkling as they faced the billows, A’ to fill the woven willows? Buy my caller herrin’, New drawn frae the Forth. Wha’ll buy my caller herrin’? They’re no brocht here without brave darin’: Buy my caller herrin’, Hauled through wind and rain. Wha’ll buy my caller herrin’? Oh! ye may ca’ them vulgar farin’: Wives and mithers, maist despairin’, Ca’ them lives o’ men.” Yet in another strain take this little advice of ethical wisdom, which, simple though it is, might have been written by Goethe:— “Saw ye ne’er a lanely lassie, Thinkin’, gin she were a wife, The sun o’ joy wad ne’er gae doun, But warm and cheer her a’ her life? Saw ye ne’er a weary wifie, Thinkin’, gin she were a lass, She wad aye be blithe and cheery, Lightly as the day wad pass? Wives and lasses, young and aged, Think na on each other’s state: Ilka ane it has its crosses; Mortal joy was ne’er complete. Ilka ane it has its blessings; Peevish dinna pass them by; But, like choicest berries, seek them, Though amang the thorns they lie.” Another and another still might be quoted, each with its peculiarity, hardly any two alike; and I am not sure but some of those that would be selected as of the highest quality were among the earliest. Certainly among the very earliest was that with which Lady Nairne’s name will ever be most fondly associated, though even that can hardly be called a song of her youth. While there is death in the world, and the heart will think of what may be beyond death, or the tears will come at the thought of parting with loved ones, or at the memory of their vanished faces in the mystic musings of the night, will not this song, wherever the Scottish tongue is spoken, be the very music of resignation struggling with heart-break?— “I’m wearin’ awa’, Jean, Like snaw-wreaths in thaw, Jean, I’m wearin’ awa’ To the land o’ the leal. There’s nae sorrow there, Jean; There’s neither cauld nor care, Jean; The day is aye fair In the land o’ the leal.