Английская поэзия XIV–XX веков в современных русских переводах - Антология
Push about, in and out, thimble them cleverly
Here’s tae King James and Donald Macgillavry
Donald’s the callan that brooks nae tangleness
Whigging, and prigging, and a’ newfangleness
They maun be gane; he winna be baukit, man
He maun hae justice, or faith he’ll tak it, man
Come like a cobler, Donald Macgillavry
Come like a cobler, Donald Macgillavry
Beat them, and bore them, and lingel them cleverly
Up wi’ King James and Donald Macgillavry
Donald was mumpit wi’ mirds and mockery
Donald was blindid wi’ blads o’ property
Arles ran high, but makings war naething, man
Lord, how Donald is flyting and fretting, man
Come like the devil, Donald Macgillavry
Come like the devil, Donald Macgillavry
Skelp them an’ scaud them that prov’d sae unbritherly
Up wi’ King James and Donald Macgillavry.
The Gipsies
Hast thou not noted on the bye-way side,
Where England’s loanings stretch unsoiled and wide,
Or by the brook that through the valley pours,
Where mimic waves play lightly through the flowers —
A noisy crew, far straggling in the glade,
Busied with trifles or in slumber laid;
Their children lolling round them on the grass,
Or pestering with their sports the patient ass?
The wrinkled grandam there you may espy,
The ripe young maiden with the glossy eye,
Men in their prime — the striplings dark and dun,
Scathed by the storms and freckled by the sun:
Oh, mark them well, when next the group you see
In vacant barn, or resting on the lea!
They are the remnant of a race of old —
Spare not the trifle for your fortune told,
For there shalt thou behold with nature blent
A tint of mind in every lineament;
A mould of soul distinct, but hard to trace,
Unknown except to Israel’s wandering race;
For thence, as sages say, their line they drew —
Oh, mark them well! the tales of old are true.
‘Tis told that once in ages long gone by,
When Christian zeal ran to extremity;
When Europe, like a flood no might could stem,
Poured forth her millions on Jerusalem;
One roaming tribe of Araby they won,
Bent on the spoil and foray just begun.
Great was their value — every path they knew,
Where sprung the fountain, where the forage grew,
And better wist than all the Christian men
How to mislead and vex the Saracen.
But when the nations by experience knew
Their folly, and from eastern realms withdrew,
The alien tribe durst not remain behind,
Empires and hordes against them were combined.
Thither they came. — But still the word of Heaven
Stedfast remains to ancient Abram given:
“Wild shall they be ’mid nations from their birth,
All hands against them — theirs against all earth”
Thus still they wander unrestrained and free
As erst their fathers did in Araby.
Peopled or not-it is the same — they view
The earth as their unalienable due,
And move by one undeviating plan
To take whate’er they may — protect who can.
Strange are their annals — Oh, regard them well!
For thou hast much to hear and I to tell.
The Auld Man’s Fareweel to his Wee House
I like ye weel, my wee auld house,
Though laigh the wa’s an’ flat the riggin’;
Though round thy lum the sourick grows,
An’ rain-draps gaw my cozy biggin’.
Lang hast thou happit mine an’ me,
My head’s grown gray aneath thy kipple;
An’ aye thy ingle cheek was free
Baith to the blind man an’ the cripple:
An’ to the puir forsaken wight
Wi’ bairnie at her bosom cryin’,
My cot was open day an’ night,
Nor wanted bed for sick to lie in.
What gart my ewes thrive on the hill,
An’ kept my little store increasin’? —
The rich man never wished me ill,
The puir man left me aye his blessin’.
Troth, I maun greet wi’ thee to part,
Though to a better house I’m flittin’;
Sic joys will never glad my heart
As I’ve had by thy hallan sittin’.
My bonnie bairns around me smiled;
My sonsie wife sat by me spinnin’,
Aye liltin’ owre her ditties wild,
In notes sae artless and sae winnin’.
Our frugal meal was aye a feast;
Our e’enin’ psalm a hymn of joy:
Aye calm an’ peacefu’ was our rest;
Our bliss, our love without alloy.
I canna help but haud thee dear,
My auld, storm-battered hamely sheilin’;
Thy sooty lum an’ kipples clear
I better lo’e than gaudy ceilin’.
Thy roof will fa’, thy rafters start,
How damp an’ cauld thy hearth will be!
Ah, sae will soon ilk honest heart,
That erst was blithe an’ bauld in thee.
I thought to cower aneath thy wa’,
Till death had closed my weary e’en;
Then left thee for the narrow ha’,
Wi’ lowly roof o’ swaird sae green.
Fareweel, my house an’ burnie clear,
My bourtree bush an’ bowzy tree;
The wee while I maun sojourn here,
I’ll
