38 A ddress of the Vice-President 



The only remaining topic on this, the last branch of our 

 subject, is the matter of song. 



For the heart to break forth into song, says Chambers 

 (in his introductory sketch to the " Songs before Burns "), 

 whether to express love, merriment, or national and political 

 sentiment, is so natural that we may safely contemplate song 

 as one of the earliest forms of literary composition in all 

 countries. As far as Scotland is concerned, tie says, we find 

 that the death of Alexander 3 (1286, A.D.) was bewailed in 

 a popular song ; that the Scots had satirical songs on Edward 

 I. and admiring ditties regarding Sir William Wallace, and 

 that the triumph over the English at Bannockburn was 

 hailed in an outburst of rude, but joyful verse. We find, he 

 adds, various allusions to popular songs in the histories of the 

 14th and 15th centuries, and in such poems of those ages as 

 have survived, — a whole catalogue of such ditties being given 

 in the comic piece called Cockelhy's Sow, which appears to 

 have been composed in the middle of the loth century. 



The vernacular literature of Scotland in early times was 

 comprised in the poems of Sir David Lindsay, the histories 

 of Sir William Wallace and the Bruce, and the ballad of 

 Graysteel. These at least formed a prominent part of the 

 old vanacular literature of the Scottish people. The tune of 

 Graysteel, says Mr Chambers (in his Book of Days, vol. 1, p. 

 533), is for certain as old as 1627, and presumed to be tradi- 

 tional from at least 1497, which was in the reign of K. 

 James 4. 



In regard to Scottish Song, several of our songs are con- 

 nected with the district, by their having their author or 

 their subject belonging to the district. In at least two of 

 our admired songs the heroines are from Dumfries. There 

 is Fair Helen of Kirkconnel. She is the heroine of a song 

 at once tender, pathetic, and beautiful. And the daughter 

 of a minister of Lochmaben is celebrated in the fine song, 

 " / gaed a waefu gate yestreen." See Stenhouse's Illustra- 

 tions of Scottish Poetry and Music, p. 142, and p. 323. 



Besides the immortal Burns, the district has had various 



