Glen Collection of printed music > Printed text > Scottish songs > Volume 2

479
Oh, oh ! if my young babe were born,
And set upon the nurse's knee,
And I myself were dead and gane,
And the green grass growing over me ! *
THE WEE THING.
MACNEIL.
Tune — Bonnie Dundee.
Saw ye my wee thing ? saw ye my ain thing ?
Saw ye my true love down on yon lea ?
Cross'd she the meadow yestreen at the gloamin ?
Sought she the burnie whar flow'rs the haw-tree ?
Her hair it is lint- white ; her skin it is milk-white ;
Dark is the blue o' her saft-roUing ee ;
Red red her ripe lips, and sweeter than roses :
Whar could my wee thing wander frae me ? —
I saw nae your wee thing, I saw nae your ain thing,
Nor saw I your true love down on yon lea ;
But I met my bonnie thing late in the gloamin,
Down by the burnie whar flow'rs the haw-tree.
Her hair it was lint-white ; her skin it was milk-white ;
Dark was the blue o' her saft -rolling ee ;
Red were her ripe lips, and sweeter than roses ;
Sweet were the kisses that she gae to me ! —
It was na my wee thing, it was na my ain thing,
It was na my true love ye met by the tree :
Proud is her leal heart I and modest her nature !
She never loed onie till ance she loed me.
* This last line is substituted from an old nurse's copy, for one less deli-
cate and pathetic, which has always hitherto been printed. The song ap-
peared first in the Tea-Table Miscellany, marked with the signature Z, in-
dicating that the editor did not know its age.