Ca' The Yowes To The Knowes


Ca' the yowes to the knowes , Ca' them where the heather grows, Ca' them where the burnie rowes , My bonie dearie As I gaed down the water-side, There I met my shepherd lad: He row'd me sweetly in his plaid, And he ca'd me his dearie. Will ye gang down the water-side, And see the waves sae sweetly glide Beneath the hazels spreading wide, The moon it shines fu' clearly. Ye sall get gowns and ribbons meet, Cauf-leather shoon upon your feet, And in my arms ye'se lie and sleep, An' ye sall be my dearie. If ye'll but stand to what ye've said, I'se gang wi' thee, my shepherd lad, And ye may row me in your plaid, And I sall be your dearie. While waters wimple to the sea, While day blinks in the lift sae hie , Till clay-cauld death sall blin' my e'e , Ye sall be my dearie. Ca' the yowes to the knowes , Ca' them where the heather grows, Ca' them where the burnie rowes , My bonie dearie

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Gerda Stevenson

About this work

This is a song by Robert Burns. It was written in 1787 and is read here by Gerda Stevenson.

More about this song

Burns described this as, ‘a beautiful song... in the true old Scotch taste’. He sent it to James Johnson for inclusion in the Scots Musical Museum, but in a letter to George Thomson in September 1794, Burns noted that he had taken the original and had added some stanzas to the song while mending other parts.

Burns originally heard the song sung by John Clunie (1757-1819), a schoolmaster and precentor at Markinch.

The alteration and improvement of the original demonstrates Burns’s ability as a preserver and restorer of traditional Scottish ballads.

Ralph McLean

Themes for this song

love

Selected for 26 September

In today's selection words and music are so beautifully made for each other as to produce one of the Bard's loveliest songs. There's a flowery wee touch of the Sylvan and the Pastoral sure, but these woods are real as is this rustic shepherd and his lass. And about the realities of rural love, there was not much Robert Burns didn't know. The expressive Scots, 'yowes' for ewes, and, 'kowes' for knolls, adds to the local, yet universal sense of emotional authenticity.

Donny O'Rourke

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