Blythe Was She^1
Tune—“Andro and his Cutty Gun.”
Chorus.—Blythe, blythe and merry was she,Blythe was she but and ben;Blythe by the banks of Earn,And blythe in Glenturit glen.
By Oughtertyre grows the aik,On Yarrow banks the birken shaw;But Phemie was a bonier lassThan braes o’ Yarrow ever saw.Blythe, blythe, &c.
Her looks were like a flow’r in May,Her smile was like a simmer morn:She tripped by the banks o’ Earn,As light’s a bird upon a thorn.Blythe, blythe, &c.
Her bonie face it was as meekAs ony lamb upon a lea;The evening sun was ne’er sae sweet,As was the blink o’ Phemie’s e’e.Blythe, blythe, &c.
The Highland hills I’ve wander’d wide,And o’er the Lawlands I hae been;But Phemie was the blythest lassThat ever trod the dewy green.Blythe, blythe, &c.
Written at Oughtertyre. Phemie is Miss Euphemia Murray, a cousin of Sir William Murray of Oughtertyre.—Lang. ↩