Volume I, song 018, page 19 - 'The last time I came o'er the Moor' - Scanned from the 1853 edition of the 'Scots Musical Museum', James Johnson and Robert Burns (Edinburgh and London: W. Blackwood & Sons, 1853)

Verse 1: 'The last time I came o'er the moor, I left my love behind me, Ye pow'rs, what pain do I endure, When soft Ideas mind me! Soon as the ruddy morn display'd, The beaming day ensuing, I met betimes my lovely maid, In fit retreats for wooing.' The 'Scots Musical Museum' is the most important of the numerous eighteenth- and nineteenth-century collections of Scottish song. When the engraver James Johnson started work on the second volume of his collection in 1787, he enlisted Robert Burns as contributor and editor. Burns enthusiastically collected songs from various sources, often expanding or revising them, whilst including much of his own work. The resulting combination of innovation and antiquarianism gives the work a feel of living tradition. It is thought that the first four lines of this song are traditional and the rest was written by Allan Ramsay (1686-1758), who included it in his 'Tea-Table Miscellany' (1724-7). Robert Burns, in notes written in an interleaved copy of the 'Museum', gives his opinion on this song's lyrics, and on the evolution of songs in general: 'The first four lines of this song evidently have belonged to a set of words much older than Ramsay's. As music is the language of nature: and poetry, particularly songs, more or less localised. .. by some of the modifications of time and place, this is the reason why so many of our Scots airs have outlived their original, and perhaps many subsequent sets of verses: except a single name, or phrase, or sometimes one or two lines, simply to distinguish the tunes by.'

Collection

Scots Musical Museum

Inventory Number

4503215

Title

Volume I, song 018, page 19 - 'The last time I came o'er the Moor' - Scanned from the 1853 edition of the 'Scots Musical Museum', James Johnson and Robert Burns (Edinburgh and London: W. Blackwood & Sons, 1853)

Object Type

PhysicalObject

Measurements

- 130 x 211 mm