One cowardly piper—At Philiphaugh—At Bothwell Bridge—At Cromdale—The Peninsular War—At Waterloo—Reay Country pipers—At Candahar—At Lucknow—In America—In Ashanti—In the Soudan—In South Africa. The pipers of a regiment are exposed to very much the same dangers as are the soldiers, and in all the history of British warfare we read of only one cowardly piper. This was _Raoghull Odhar_, a Highlander, who, being one day in the exercise of his duty in the battlefield along with his clan, was seized with such terror at the sight of the enemy, whom he thought too many for his party, that he left off playing and began to sing a most dolorous song to a lachrymose air. Some stanzas were picked up by his comrades, and afterwards when an adult was seen crying for some trifling cause he was said to be singing “Dun Ronald’s tune.” Likewise when a Highlander threatened vengeance for some boisterous mischief he would say, “I will make you sing Dun Ronald’s tune.” Where or when the incident which gave rise to the saying took place we cannot tell, and so the only story of a cowardly piper that we have on record is not very well authenticated. On the other hand, we have numerous instances of the bravery of pipers. Away back as far as the battle of Philiphaugh we have a duplicate of the Dargai incident, only more so. There is a part of the Ettrick opposite the field of battle called “The Piper’s Pule.” Tradition says that a piper belonging to Montrose’s army planted himself on a knowe overhanging this part of the river, during the course of the engagement, cheered his companions, who were fighting below, with a well-known cavalier tune, the refrain of which was:— “Whirry, Whigs, awa’ man, Whirry, Whigs, awa’, Ye’re but a pack o’ brosy mou’s, Ye’ll dae nae gude at a’,” until one of Leslie’s men sent a shot across the water which brought the piper tumbling down the brae and laid him snug in the pool which bears his name. Then, again depending on tradition, at the battle of Bothwell Bridge in 1679, the piper to Clavers’ own troop stood out on the brink of the Clyde playing “Awa’, Whigs, awa,” with great glee, but, being struck by a bullet, he rolled down the bank in the agonies of death, and always as he rolled over the bag, so intent was he on the old party tune, that with determined firmness of fingering he made the pipes to yell out two or three notes more of it, till at last he plunged into the river and was carried peaceably down the stream among a great number of Whigs. There is a striking resemblance between the two traditions, and possibly they are but variations of one, but I give them as I find them.