Glen Collection of printed music > Printed text > Illustrated book of Scottish songs from the sixteenth to the nineteenth century

CONVIVIAL SONGS. 231
Johnny Smith has got a wife
Wha scrimps him o' his cogie ;
But were she mine, upon my life
I'd dook her in a bogie ;
For I maun hae my cogie, sirs,
I canna want my cogie;
I wadna gi'e my three-gir'd cog
For a' the wives in Bogie.
Twa three todlin' weans they hae,
The pride o' a' Stra'bogie ;
Whene'er the totums cry for meat.
She curses aye his cogie,
Crying, " Wae betide the three-gir'd cog !
Oh, wae betide the cogie !
It does mair skaith than a' the ills
That happen in Stra'bogie."
She fand him ance at Willie Sharpe's ;
And, what the maist did laugh at.
She brak the bicker, spilt the drink.
And tightly gouff 'd his haflfet.
Crying, *' Wae betide the three-gir'd cog !
Oh, wae betide the cogie !
It does mair skaith than a' the ills
That happen in Stra'bogie."
Yet here's to ilka honest soul
Wha'll drink wi' me a cogie ;
And for ilk silly whinging fool.
We'll dook him in the Bogie.
For I maun hae my cogie, sirs,
I canna want my cogie ;
I wadna gie my three-gir'd cog
For a' the wives in Bogie.
This song was popular in Aberdeenshire in the middle of the eighteenth centnty .
There are at least half-a-dozen Scottish songs parodies upon, or emendations of, this.
One, by Alexander fourth Duke of Gordon, appears among the Miscellaneous Songs
in this volume ; and a second was printed in Herd's Collection.