Dance Ha! Ha! The Wooin' o' it 2713

William Stenhouse states that Duncan Gray, after whom the tune to this dance is named, actually lived. He was a carter in Glasgow and the air whiuch he habitually whistled was taken down by a musician. Robert Burns called it “that kind of light-horse gallop of an old air which precludes sentiment. Ludicrous is the leading feature.”

Burns wrote several versions of “Duncan Gray”. The first appeared in James Johnson’s The Scots Musical Museum, Volume 1, of 1787.

Weary fa’ you, Duncan Gray!
   (Ha, ha, the girdin o’t!),
Wae gae by you, Duncan Gray!
   (Ha, ha, the girdin o’t!),
When a’ the lave gae to their play,
Then I maun sit the lee-lang day,
And jeeg the cradle wi’ my tae,
   And a’ for the girdin o’t!

Bonie was the Lammas moon
   (Ha, ha, the girdin o’t!),
Glowrin a’ the hills aboon
   (Ha, ha, the girdin o’t!),
The girdin brak, the beast cam down,
I tint my curch and baith by shoon,
And, Duncan, ye’re an uno loun –
   Wae on the bad girdin o’t!

But Duncan, gin ye’ll keep your aith
   (Ha, ha, the girdin o’t!),
I’se bless you wi’ my hindmost breath,
   (Ha, ha, the girdin o’t!),
Duncan, gin ye’ll keep your aith,
The beast again can bear us baith,
And auld Mess John will mend the scaith,
   And clout the bad girdin o’t.

Stenhouse says, “The comic verses to which it is united in the Museum, beginning ‘Weary fa you, Duncan Gray – Ha, ha, the girdin’ o’t,’, are taken from the old song with considerable alterations, by Burns. Our poet, however, wrote another exceedingly humorous song to the same tune in December 1792, which is here subjoined.”

Duncan Gray came here to woo,
   Ha, ha, the wooing o’t,
On blythe yule-night, when we were fou,
   Ha, ha, the wooing o’t.
Maggie coost her head fu’ high,
Look’d asklent and unco skeigh,
Gart poor Duncan stand abeigh;
   Ha, ha, the wooing o’t.

Duncan fleech’d and Duncan pray’d,
   Ha, ha, the wooing o’t.
Meg was deaf as Ailsa Craig,
   Ha, ha, the wooing o’t.
Duncan sighed baith out and in,
Grat his een baith bleer’d and blin’
Spak o’ lowpin o’er a linn,
   Ha, ha, the wooing o’t.

Time and chance are but a tide,
   Ha, ha, the wooing o’t.
Slighted love is sair to bide,
   Ha, ha, the wooing o’t.
“Shall I, like a fool”, quo’ he,
“For a haughty hizzie die?
She may gae to – France for me!”
   Ha, ha, the wooing o’t.

How it comes let doctors tell,
   Ha, ha, the wooing o’t.
Meg grew sick as he grew well,
   Ha, ha, the wooing o’t.
Something in her bosom rings,
For relief a sigh she brings;
And O, her een, they spak sic things!
   Ha, ha, the wooing o’t.

Duncan was a lad o’ grace,
   Ha, ha, the wooing o’t.
Maggie’s was a piteous case,
   Ha, ha, the wooing o’t.
Duncan could na be her death,
Swelling pity smoor’d his wrath,
Now they’re crouse and canty baith,
   Ha, ha, the wooing o’t.

Burns wrote a third version, less polite or amusing, beginning “Can you play me, Duncan Gray” for the private collection which became The Merry Muses of Caledonia after its posthumous publication in 1800.

In regard to the fourth version, this time in English, of a song set to the air of “Duncan Gray”, Burns wrote to George Thomson, publisher of A Select Collection of Scottish Airs, “These English songs gravel me to death. – I have not that command of the language that I have of my native tongue. – In fact, I think my ideas are more barren in English than in Scottish. – I have been at ‘Duncan Gray’ to dress it in English, but all I can do is deplorably stupid.” The first verse proves Burns’ point.

Let not women e’er complain
   Of inconstancy in love!
Let not women e’er complain
   Fickle man is apt to rove!
Look abroad thro’ Nature’s range,
Nature’s mighty law is change:
Ladies, whould it not be strange
   Men should then a monster prove.