"Craignure," he would say, "I remember your story of the young King of Easaidh Ruadh; might we have it anew?" Or, "Donald, is the Glassary song of the Target in your mind? It haunts me like a charm."
And the stories came free, and in the owercome of the songs the dark of Glen Noe joined most lustily.
Songs will be failing from the memory in the ranging of the years, the passions that rose to them of old burned low in the ash, so that many of the sweetest ditties I heard on that night in Glen Noe have long syne left me for ever--all but one that yet I hum to the children at my knee. It was one of John Splendid's; the words and air were his as well as the performance of them, and though the English is a poor language wherein to render any fine Gaelic sentiment, I cannot forbear to give something of its semblance here. He called it in the Gaelic "The Sergeant of Pikes," and a few of its verses as I mind them might be Scotticed so--
When I sat in the service o' foreign commanders, Selling a sword for a beggar man's fee, Learning the trade o' the warrior who wanders, To mak' ilka stranger a sworn enemie; There was ae thought that nerved roe, and brawly it served me. With pith to the claymore wherever I won,-- 'Twas the auld sodger's story, that, gallows or glory, The Hielan's, the Hielan's were crying me on!
I tossed upon swinging seas, splashed to my kilted knees, Ocean or ditch, it was ever the same; In leaguer or sally, tattoo or revally, The message on every pibroch that came, Was "Cruachan, Cruachan, O son remember us, Think o' your fathers and never be slack!" Blade and buckler together, though far off the heather, The Hielan's, the Hielan's were all at my back!
The ram to the gate-way, the torch to the tower, We rifled the kist, and the cattle we maimed; Our dirks stabbed at guess through the leaves o' the bower, And crimes we committed that needna be named: Moonlight or dawning grey, Lammas or Lady-day, Donald maun dabble his plaid in the gore; He maun hough and maun harry, or should he miscarry, The Hielan's, the Hielan's will own him no more!
And still, O strange Providence! mirk is your mystery, Whatever the country that chartered our steel Because o' the valiant repute o' our history, The love o' our ain land we maistly did feel; Many a misty glen, many a sheiling pen, Rose to our vision when slogans rang high; And this was the solace bright came to our starkest fight, A' for the Hielan's, the Hielan's we die!