Glen Collection of printed music > Printed text > Jacobite minstrelsy

MINSTRELSY. 233
How proud were we of our young prince,
And of his native sway !
But all our hopes are past and gone,
Upon Culloden day.
There was no lack of bravery there,
No spare of blood or breath,
For, one to two, our foes we dar'd,
For freedom or for death.
The bitterness of grief is past,
Of terror and dismay :
The die was risk'd, and foully cast,
Upon Culloden day.
And must thou seek a foreign clime,
In poverty to pine,
No friend or clansman by thy side,
No vassal that is thine ?
Leading thy young son by the hand,
And trembling for his life,
As at the name of Cumberland
He grasps his father's knife.*
■jies of mournful and affecting ditties on the results of that battle,
in which all the hopes of the bold asseitors of the right of the
Stuarts were for ever annihilated. The subject of the song is the
address of a Highland bard to the Lady of his chief, in which he
attempts to comfort her with the horrid proposal of killing her,
and hiding her in the grave of her father, rather than suffer her
to be taken or disgraced by the enemy — a strong feature of the dis-
pair to which the unfortunate Highlanders were reduced, after the
defeat and dispersion of the Prince's army. The air bears the
same name with the song. The latter is called in the Gaelic, from
-which it is a translation, " N'ciial sibh mar thackair dhuin>'
* The sentiments expressed in this song were roused and greatly-
aggravated by many abominable acts of attrocity committed by the
royal army, even before the final catastrophe at Culloden. The
following anecdote, related by the Chevalier Johnstone, while it
illustrates the severe policy pursued by the existing government,
shows by what unjustifiable acts the Highlanders were goaded to
revenge, and needlessly rendered more fiercely wedded to the cause
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