Glen Collection of printed music > Printed music > Songs of Scotland > Volume 2

APPENDIX. 169
" The beautiful air of ' My Nannie, !' was an especial favourite of Burns in Iiis ploughboy days, and the song
■which he then wrote for it, iu point of rural imagery and pastoral simplicity, he hardly ever afterwards surpassed.
Tliis song appeared in the Kilmarnock edition of Burns' poems, 1786. Some fifty years thereafter, a hunt was
made for a heroine hy an annotator, when it was discovered that a servant girl, named Agnes Fleming, had lived
at Dowery, near Lochlea, at the time that William Burness occupied that farm. This evidence was thought quite
sufficient. No more was sought. The note was written— the affaii- was settled — and Agnes Fleming, however
plain in look, must have been more than woman had she refused the heroineship of so sweet a song, after the
gratuitous manner in wliich it had been thrust upon her. ' Nannie,' it is said, owned ' the soft impeachment' in
her own homely manner, and was likely to have carried off the prize, if we had not stepped in and placed the
chaplet on the brow of one who had actually wounded the heart of the poet. On oui- mentioning this subject to
Mrs. Begg, the poet's youngest sister, she could scarcely repress her resentment; assm-ing us that Agnes Fleming,
■whom she knew, had no pretensions, either morally or physically, to be considered the heroine of that fine song.
'Pray then,' we inquired, ' who was the heroine?' ' Peggy Thomson,' was tlie reply, 'the fair fiflette that upset
the poet's trigonometry at Kirkoswald.' It may be objected, that by substituting the name of the imaginary
heroine ' Nannie,' in place of the real one ' Peggy,' the points do not tally so well; but Burns knew perfectly what
he was about. He was writing a song for ' one of the best of our Scottish melodies,' and knew that it was much
better to retain the well-known bui'den of ' My Nannie, !' whatever might be the name of the goddess at ■whose
shi'uie he was offering up the incense of his poetic idolatry. Allan Cunningham avers that Burns celebrated the
praise of this favourite fair one in no less than four other songs ; in two of which, ' Montgomery's Peggy,' and
' Bonnie Peggy Alison,' — the names of the airs are substituted for that of the heroine. Why then may not Peggy
Thomson figui-e in a fifth song imder the guise of ' My Nannie, ?' But if other evidence were wanted than that
which we have adduced, as to the heroine of tliis song, it is at hand, and upon the very best authority, -riz., that of
the Bard himself. In Burns' Common-Place Book, begun in 1783, wherein this song was inscribed, (See Cromek's
ReUques, p. 326,) he remarks, ' Whether the following song will stand the test [of eriticism), I wiU not pretend to
say, because it is my own ; only I can say it was, at the time, genuine from the heart.' Here Burns confesses that tliis
song was written in a fit of ' real passion,' such as that which he felt for Peggy Thomson. But who, until some fifty
years after the poet's death, ever heard of Ms making love to Agnes Fleming, either in prose or verse ? Then
was ' Nannie' disentombed, that she might, like an Egyptian mummy, be embalmed in the poet's verse, merely
because she had the good luck to be kirseiud ' Nannie,' or Agnes. At all events it must be admitted, that the living
testimony of Mi'S. Begg on this question, is to be preferred to any information gleaned from other persons half a
century after the poet's death. Having set aside the claim of Agnes Fleming to the heroineship of this song, we
may remai'k, that few poets have sung so sweetly of the ' cannie hour at e'en ' as Burns, and none seems to have
enjoyed its inspiration more ; but it was impossible that he could have been owre the lugs in love with all ' the nymphs
that he loved and caressed,' of which we are now about to give a list. Nothing Uke chronological order has been
attempted, as no dates could be found to guide us in our curious research, further than what the poet liimself has
given US. Fu'st and foremost is 'Handsome Nell,' she of 'the nettle-stings and thistles ;' — 'Montgomery's Peggy;' —
' Annie' of the ' Barley Rigs ;' — the Lass of ' Cessnook-banks ;' — the Lass among ' yon ■wild mossy mountains ; '* —
' Mary Morrison ; 'f — ' Highland Mary ;' — ' Black-e'ed Bess,' and ' Bonnie Jean.' If we reckon that he was sincerely
attached (for the time being) to less than the one-half of them, we will, probably, come near the truth, viz., Peggy
Thomson, the Lass of Cessnock-banks, Highland Mary, and Jean Armour."
" THE LASS OF CESSNOOK-BAUKS."
In the posthumous edition of Burns' Works edited by Dr. Cm-rie, the second volume, containing the " General Cor-
respondence," opened with four letters addressed to E. B., which were afterwards withdrawn in subsequent editions.
AUan Cunningham observes in a note, that they were omitted " for reasons which may be easily imagined ;" while on
the contrary, the Ettrick Shepherd, in his Life of the Poet says, "for what reason Gilbert Burns omitted them in his
edition, / cannot imagine.'" Where poets differ so widely, plain prose-men may be excused for offering an opinion.
Certain it is, that they are among the most sensible of that class of letters, and no edition of Bui-ns' Works would
now be complete without them. These amatory effusions are so unlike the general style of Burns, that they have
puzzled his biographers, and become a stumblingblock to the critics — all save to him of the Westminster, who, if our
waning memory is not altogether at fault, at once settled the matter to his own satisfaction — (ha^ving solved in a
former number the cause of Dr. Johnson's interminable tea-diinkings) — by finding that they were the fii-st four
letters of a novel, written a, la Richardson, merely by way of trying the powers of the poet's unfledged pen in a
* Bums, when he came to speak of this song, suppressed the name of the heroine. In his memoranda, he says, " This song alludes to a
part of my private history which it is of no consequence to the world to know." Gilbert Buras could not throw any light on this part of the
Poefs history ; and his sister, Mrs. Begg, is equally ignorant, Mr. Cunningham avers, that the heroine is either " Nannie," who dwelt by the
Lugar, or " Highland Mary." "We have narrowed the conjecture so far, by proving that it was not Agnes Fleming. Mr. Motherwell, in a note
on this song remarks, " "We scarce think it a spontaneous burst of passion, but rather a lyric made accordiytg to ordi^." In contradiction of
this. Bums, in a letter to George Thomson, in October 1792, says, — " You must know, that all my earliest love-songs were the breathings
of ardent passiof)."
^ There is much of the spirit of ballad poetry in this fine song in praise of " Mary Morrison." She has hitherto escaped the reseajch of
aunotators, nor does Mrs. Begg know anything respecting hei*.