Volume II, song 120, page 125 - 'Fife and a' the lands...
Volume II, song 120, page 125 - 'Fife and a' the lands about it' - Scanned from the 1853 edition of the 'Scots Musical Museum', James Johnson and Robert Burns (Edinburgh and London: W. Blackwood & Sons, 1853)
Verse 1: 'Allan by his grief excited, Long the victim of despair, Thus deplor'd his passion slighted, Thus addressed the scornful fair. Fife and all the lands about it, Undesiring I can see; Joy may crown my days without it, Not, my charmer, without thee.'
The 'Scots Musical Museum' is the most important of the numerous eighteenth- and nineteenth-century collections of Scottish song. When the engraver James Johnson started work on the second volume of his collection in 1787, he enlisted Robert Burns as contributor and editor. Burns enthusiastically collected songs from various sources, often expanding or revising them, whilst including much of his own work. The resulting combination of innovation and antiquarianism gives the work a feel of living tradition.
According to Burns, in his notes on the 'Museum', 'this song is Dr. Blacklock's'. Burns further comments that 'He, as well as I, often gave Johnson verses, trifling enough perhaps, but they served as a vehicle to the music.' Dumfriesshire born Thomas Blacklock (1721-91), also known as 'the blind bard', was a minor poet and great admirer of Burns. Soon after the publication of Burns's Kilmarnock volume (1786), a correspondence and friendship sprung up between the two men which lasted until Blacklock's death in 1791.
Volume II, song 120, page 125 - 'Fife and a' the lands about it' - Scanned from the 1853 edition of the 'Scots Musical Museum', James Johnson and Robert Burns (Edinburgh and London: W. Blackwood & Sons, 1853)