WeRead Powered by ReaderPub
Poems and Songs of Robert Burns cover

Poems and Songs of Robert Burns

Chapter 295: Song—Willie Brew’d A Peck O’ Maut1
By Robert Burns
Open in WeRead

Explore more books like this:

Classics of LiteraturePoetry

About This Book

The collection assembles lyrical songs, narrative poems, satirical pieces, epistles, epitaphs, and fragments that shift between convivial drinking verses, tender laments, and comic storytelling. Many lyrics were shaped to traditional airs and preserve vernacular speech, while longer works portray rural labor, domestic scenes, and compassionate encounters with animals. Satire targets religious hypocrisy and social pretension, and several poems take a direct, personal tone of moral reflection or affectionate address. The selections alternate moods and forms, emphasizing melodic phrasing and a versatile technical range.

Song—Willie Brew’d A Peck O’ Maut1

O Willie brew’d a peck o’ maut, And Rob and Allen cam to see; Three blyther hearts, that lee-lang night, Ye wadna found in Christendie. Chorus.—We are na fou, we’re nae that fou, But just a drappie in our ee; The cock may craw, the day may daw And aye we’ll taste the barley bree. Here are we met, three merry boys, Three merry boys I trow are we; And mony a night we’ve merry been, And mony mae we hope to be! We are na fou, &c. It is the moon, I ken her horn, That’s blinkin’ in the lift sae hie; She shines sae bright to wyle us hame, But, by my sooth, she’ll wait a wee! We are na fou, &c. Wha first shall rise to gang awa, A cuckold, coward loun is he! Wha first beside his chair shall fa’, He is the King amang us three. We are na fou, &c. [Footnote 1: Willie is Nicol, Allan is Masterton the writing— master. The scene is between Moffat and the head of the Loch of the Lowes. Date, August—September, 1789.—Lang.]