J. F. Campbell Collection > Popular rhymes of Scotland

RHYMES ON PLACES. 15
notice, is the claim which has been put forward by Sir
Walter Scott for Thomas of Ercildoun as the author of the
metrical romance of ' Sir Tristrem.' I must admit that
Mr Park has shown very strong" reasons for doubting- the
title of the Rhymer to this honour.
Those rhymes of True Thomas which bear most appear-
ance of being- genuine (that is, really uttered by him), are
generally of a melancholy and desponding- cast, such as
might well be expected to proceed from a man of a fine turn
of mind, who felt himself and his country on the verge of
great calamities. One of these melancholy sayings referred
to the prospects of his own household —
The hare shall kittle on my hearthstanc.
And there never will be a Laird Leannont again.
This emphatic image of desolation is said by the people of
Earlstoun to have been realised within the memory of man,
and at a period long subsequent to the termination of the
race of Learmont. It is remarkable, as showing the idea to
be no new one, that the fii'st line occurs, though incorrectly,
in an old manuscript of Scottish political prophecies in the
Harleian Library — ' When hare kendles o' the her'stane ;'
and it is in like manner inaccurately quoted in Andro
Hart's volume —
' This is a true saying that Thomas of tells,
The hare shall hirple on the hard stane.'
Another relates to a place in his immediate neighbour-
hood —
A horse shall gang on Carrolside brae,
Till the girth gaw his side.
We have here, apparently, a foreboding of some terrible
famine which he apprehended as likely to arise from the
war of the disputed succession. He said also —
The burn of Breid
Sail rin fn' reid ;
a mysterious allusion to the bloodshed at Bannockburn —
bannock being the chief bread of Scotland in tkose days.
One of the more terrible predictions of the Rhymer is as
follows : —
At Threeburn Grange, on an after day,
There shall be a lang and bloody fray;