Vainly you snarl anent
New Act of Parliament,

Bidding you vanish from dairy and "lauder ;"*
Dogs, you have had your day,

Down tail and slink away;

You'll pick no more bones on this side of the border.

Hence to the hills where your fathers stole cattle;

Hence to the glens where they skulked from the law; Hence to the moors where they vanished from battle, Crying, "De'il tak the hindmost," and "Charlie's awa'." Metal is clanking here;

Off with your banking gear;

Off, ere you're paid "to Old Harry or order :"
England shall many a day

Wish you'd been far away,

Long ere your kite's-wings flew over the border.

March, march, Ettrick and Teviotdale,

Pay-day's the word, lads, and gold is the law,
March, march, Eskdale and Liddesdale;
Tagdale, and Ragdale, and Bobdale, and a':
Person or purse, they say;

Purse you have none to pay;

Your persons who'll deal with, except the Recorder?
Yet, to retrieve your freaks,

You can just leave your breeks;

You'll want them no more when you're over the border.

High on a pole in the vernal sun's baskings,

When April has summoned your ragships away, We'll hoist up a pair of your best galligaskins, Entwined with young thistles to usher in May Types of Scotch "copital,"

They shall o'ertop-it-all,

Stripped off from bearer and brushed into order;
Then if you tarry, rogues,

Nettles you'll get for brogues,

And to the Rogue's March be drummed o'er the border.

* Scoticé for larder.

MARGERY DAW.

Agite inspicite: aurum est. Profecto, spectatores, Comicum. Verum ad hanc rem agundam Philippum est.

Plautus in Panulo.

CHORUS OF PAPER MONEY MAKERS.

SEE-SAW, Margery Daw,

Spent all her gold and made money of straw.

Margery Daw was our prototype fair :

She built the first bank ever heard of:
Her treasury ripened and dried in the air,
And governments hung on the word of
Margery Daw, Margery Daw,

Who spent all her gold and made money of straw.

Mother Goose was a blue of exceeding éclat,

She wielded a pen, not a thimble :

She made a fine ode about Margery Daw,
Which was but a mystical symbol:

"See-saw, Margery Daw,

Sold her bed and lay upon straw."

Margery borrowed the little folks' gold,

And lent it the great folks to fight with: They shot it abroad over woodland and wold, Till things began not to go right with Margery Daw, Margery Daw,

Who spent all her gold and made money of straw.

The little folks roared for their gold back again,
And Margery trembled with terror;

She called for relief to the land's mighty men,
And they said she must pay for her error;
"See-saw, look to your straw :

We've nothing to say to you, Margery Daw."

Margery Daw was alarmed for her straw: Her wishes this speech didn't suit with, "Oho! mighty men !" said Margery then,

"You'll get no more money to shoot with; See-saw, pile up the straw;

Bring me a flambeau," said Margery Daw.

They looked very bold, but they very soon saw
That their coffers began to look drossy;
So they made it a law that fair Margery's straw,
Should be gold both in esse and posse.
"See-saw, Margery's straw,

Is golden by nature, and gold by the law."

Margery Daw struck the sky with her head,
And strode o'er the earth like a goddess;
And the sword of the conqueror yielded like lead,
When it smote upon Margery's bodice.

See-saw, plenty of straw

Will make us all glorious as Margery Daw.

The conqueror fell, and the mighty men saw
That they seemed to be safer and stronger;
And then they turned round upon Margery Daw,
Saying, "Straw shall be metal no longer.
See-saw, Margery Daw,

Get your gold back again, chop up your straw."

Margery wearied her eloquent lips:

They had never received her so coldly :

A-kimbo they stood, with their hands on their hips, And their right feet put forward most boldly:

"See-saw, Margery Daw,

Get your gold back again, chop up your straw."

Margery put forth her powerful hand,

She seized on the straw all around her; And up rose a flame at her word of command, Like the furnace of any brass-founder.

"See-saw, Margery Daw

Wants her gold back again: flames to the straw."

The omnipotent straw, that had been the world's law, Was soon only cinder and ember:

Such a blaze was ne'er seen round Guy Faux on a green, On the night of the fifth of November.

"See-saw, pile up the straw,

There's a brave bonfire," said Margery Daw.

Down fell, as beneath mighty Juggernaut's car,
The small fry of straw-money makers,
The tumult of ruin, from near and from far,
Once more made the mighty men Quakers:
See-saw, Margery Daw,

Off with the gold again : give us more straw."

The Jews made a project for Margery Daw,
She thought it too ticklish for trying;
But they sent her a Scotchman exceedingly braw,
To prove 'twas as easy as lying:

"See-saw, Margery Daw,

A wee bit o' gold and a mickle of straw."

Margery heard the Mac Puzzlehead preach,

And she was no whit a logician,

She knew little more than the eight parts of speech,
Though she wrote with amazing precision

"Margery Daw," "Margery Daw,"
The prettiest writing the world ever saw.

Margery scattered her treasures abroad,

And who was so glorious as she then? He who was backward in Margery's laud, Mac Puzzlehead proved, was a Heathen. See-saw, gold in the straw,

Who was so glorious as Margery Daw?

Up started the small fry of straw money men,
Who seemed to have fallen for ever;

They scattered their straw o'er the nation again,

And chorused as yet they had never :

See-saw, plenty of straw,

Will make us all glorious as Margery Daw."

Margery's glory was darkened afresh,

The great men again stood a-kimbo;

She feared she was caught in Mac Puzzlehead's mesh,
Who had argued her gold out of limbo.
"See-saw, pile up the straw,

Bring me a flambeau," said Margery Daw.

Again in her anger she darkened the air
With the smoke of a vast conflagration,
And again to the earth in dismay and despair,
Fell the heroes of straw circulation.

See-saw, Margery Daw

Owes you no courtesy: burn your own straw."

Around and about came a glad rabble rout,
The flames from a distance discerning ;

And shouting they saw, in the midst of the straw,
Mac Puzzlehead's effigy burning.

"See-saw, pile up the straw,

Roast the Mac Puzzlehead, Margery Daw."

But then to the sky rose a terrible cry,

A long and a loud lamentation;

Aud Margery's halls rang with wailings and calls

That filled her with deep consternation :

"Straw, straw, give us some straw;

Straw, or we perish, sweet Margery Daw."

And what happened then? Oh, what happened then?
Oh! where is the rest of the story?

And what was devised by the land's mighty men,
To renovate Margery's glory?

Oh, there is a flaw in the volume of straw,
That tells the true story of Margery Daw.

But we find if we pore ancient manuscripts o'er
With deep antiquarian endeavour,

That Margery's straw became metal once more,*
And she was as glorious as ever.

See-saw, plenty of straw

Will make us all glorious as Margery Daw.

"If it be not now, yet it will come: THE READINESS IS ALL.” -Hamlet.