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Title: The Counterblast Ironical
Author: Robert Louis Stevenson [
More Titles by Stevenson]
It's strange that God should fash to frame
The yearth and lift sae hie,
An' clean forget to explain the same
To a gentleman like me.
They gutsy, donnered ither folk,
Their weird they weel may dree;
But why present a pig in a poke
To a gentleman like me?
They ither folk their parritch eat
An' sup their sugared tea;
But the mind is no to be wyled wi' meat
Wi' a gentleman like me.
They ither folk, they court their joes
At gloamin' on the lea;
But they're made of a commoner clay, I suppose,
Than a gentleman like me.
They ither folk, for richt or wrang,
They suffer, bleed, or dee;
But a' thir things are an emp'y sang
To a gentleman like me.
It's a different thing that I demand,
Tho' humble as can be -
A statement fair in my Maker's hand
To a gentleman like me:
A clear account writ fair an' broad,
An' a plain apologie;
Or the deevil a ceevil word to God
From a gentleman like me.
FOOTNOTE:
TABLE OF COMMON SCOTTISH VOWEL SOUNDS
ae }
ae } = open A as in rare.
a' }
au } = AW as in law
aw }
ea = open E as in mere, but this with exceptions, as
heather = heather, wean=wain, lear=lair.
ee }
ei } = open E as in mere.
ie }
oa = open O as in more.
ou = doubled O as in poor.
ow = OW as in bower.
u = doubled O as in poor.
ui or u-umlaut before R = (say roughly) open A as in
rare.
ui or u-umlaut before any other consonant = (say roughly)
close I as in grin.
y = open I as in kite.
i = pretty nearly what you please, much as in English,
Heaven guide the reader through that labyrinth! But in Scots
it dodges usually from the short I, as in grin, to the open E,
as in mere. Find the blind, I may remark, are prounced to
rhyme with the preterite of grin.
[The end]
Robert Louis Stevenson's poem: Counterblast Ironical
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