with critical observations and biographical notices, by Robert Burns

96
Then to his bags he flew wi' speed,
About the drdne he twisted ;
Meg up and wallop'd o'er the green,
For brawly could she frisk it.
Weel done ! quo' he— play up ! quo' she
Weel bobb'd !
quo' Rob the Ranter
*Tis worth my while to play indeed,
When I hae sic a dancer.
Weel hae ye play'd your part, quo' Meg,
Your cheeks are like the crimson
There's nane in Scotland plays sae weel,
Since we lost Habbie Simpson.''^
the Editor, that when a boy (not more than twenty years ago)
he was greatly struck with the sight of many of these old High^
land Pipers, straying, solitary, from parish to parish, reciting the
deeds of the clans. •
In every parish there were houses which the open heartedness
of their possessors made welcome nightly habitations to these
vagrant remnants of ancient chivalry. The piper's arrival
spread like wild-fire among the little country villages. The old
decayed men, the lads and lasses, with their rocks and knitting
apparatus, flocked around the old piper, who, seated next the
gudematiy on the lang-settle, in the intervals of his tunes touched
on the tales of other times. The barbarity of fVilliam, in the vale
of Glencoe; the Rade of Mar; or the year 1715 ; and the awful suf-
fei'ings of misguided Catholic loyalty in 1745, were told with the
exquisite mastery of native eloquence.
The celebrated Piper of Kilbarchan«