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Some canker'd, surly, sour-mou'd carlin,
Bred near the abbey o' Dumfarline,
Your shoulders yet may gie a lounder
And be o' verse the mal-confounder.

Come on, ye blades! but e'er ye tulzie, Or hack our flesh wi' sword or gullie, Ne'er shaw your teeth, nor look like stink, Nor owre an empty bicker blink :

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What weets the wizen and the wyme,

Will mend your prose, and heal my rhyme.

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ELEGY

ON JOHN HOGG,

Porter to the University of St. Andrew's

DEATH! what's ado? the deil be licket,
Or wi' your stang you ne'er had pricket,
Or our auld Alma Mater tricket,

O' poor John Hogg,

And trail'd him ben thro' your mark wicket,

As dead's a log.

Now ilka glaikit scholar loun

May dander wae wi' duddy gown;

Kate Kennedy (7) to dowie crune

May mourn and clink,

And steeples o' Saunt Andrew's Town

To yird may sink.

Sin' Pauly Tam (9), wi' canker'd snout,

First held the students in about,

ELEGY ON JOHN HOG G.

To wear their claes as black as soot,

They ne'er had reason

Till Death John's haffit gae a clout,
Sae out o' season.

Whan Regents met at common schools, He taught auld Tam to hale the dools, And eident to row right the bowls,

Like ony emmack;

He kept us a' within the rules

Strict academic.

2

Heh! wha will tell the students now
To meet the Pauly cheek for chow,
Whan he, like frightsome wirrikow,

Had wont to rail,

And set our stamacks in a low,

Or we turn'd tail P

Ah, Johnny aften did I grumble

Frae cozy bed fu' ear' to tumble,

ELEGY ON JOHN HOGG.

Whan art and part I'd been in some ill,
Troth, I was swear:

His words they broodit like a wumill,

Frae ear to ear.

Whan I had been fu' laith to rise,

John then begude to moralize :

"The tither nap, the sluggard cries,

"And turns him round:

"Sae spak auld Solomon the wise,

"Divine profound!"

Nae dominie, or wise Mess John,

Was better lear'd in Solomon;

He cited proverbs, one by one,

Ilk vice to tame;

He gar'd ilk sinner sigh and groan,

And fear hell's flame.

"I hae nae meikle skill, (quo' he),

"In what you ca' philosophy;

ELEGY ON JOHN HOGG.

"It tells that baith the earth and sea

"Rin round about:

"Either the bible tells a lie,

"Or ye're a' out.

"It's i' the Psalms o' David writ,

"That this wide warld ne'er shou'd flit,

"But on the waters coshly sit

"Fu' steeve and lasting :

"And was na he a head o' wit

"At sic contestin ?"

On e'enings cauld wi' glee we'd trudge
To heat our shins in Johnny's lodge;
The deil ane thought his bum to budge
Wi' siller on us:

To claw het pints we'd never grudge
O' molationis.

Say, ye red gowns! that aften here

Hae toasted Cakes to Katle's beer,

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