The Lea Rig
The oldest version of “The Lea Rig” or “My Ain Kind Dearie, O” begins:
I’ll rowe thee o’er the lea-rig,
My ain kind dearie, O;
I’ll rowe thee o’er the lea-rig,
My ain kind dearie, O.
Altho’ the night were ne’er sae wat,
And I were ne’er sae weary, O,
I’ll rowe thee o’er the lea-rig,
My ain kind dearie, O.
Robert Fergusson (1750–1774) wrote the song “My Ain Kind Dearie, O”
which appears in James Johnson’s
The Scots Musical Museum
, Volume 1, 1787.
Will ye gang o’er the lee-rigg,
My ain kind deary-o!
And cuddle there sae kindly wi’ me,
My ain kind deary-o!
At thornie dike and birken-tree,
We’ll daff and ne’er be weary-o;
They’ll scug ill een frae you and me,
Mine ain kind deary-o!
Nae herds wi’ kent, or colly there,
Shall ever come to fear ye-o;
But lav’rocks, whistling in the air,
Shall woo, like me, their deary-o!
While others herd their lambs and ewes,
And toil for world’s gear, my jo,
Upon the lee my pleasure grows,
Wi’ you, my kind deary-o!
Fergusson, the son of an Edinburgh accountant, studied for a short time at St. Andrews University,
but upon the death of his father he was forced into the drudgery of legal copyist.
In “Epistle to William Simson”, Robert Burns wrote:
O Fergusson! thy glorious parts
Ill suited law’s dry, musty arts!
My curse upon your whunstane hearts,
Ye Enbrugh Gentry!
The tythe o’ what ye waste at cartes
Wad stow’d his pantry!
In 1772 Fergusson’s first poem was published and in 1774, at the age of twenty-four,
he died in a mad-house.
But in those two years Fergusson wrote some of the greatest poetry in the Scots vernacular,
poems that had a profound and acknowledged influence on Burns.
A comparison of “My Ain Kind Dearie, O” with Burns’ “The Lea Rig”
shows how much Burns owed to Fergusson.
When o’er the hill the eastern star
Tells bughtin time is near, my jo,
And owsen frae the furrow’d field
Return sae dowf and weary, O,
Down by the burn, where scented birks
Wi’ dew are hanging clear, my jo,
I’ll meet thee on the lea-rig,
My ain kind dearie, O.
At midnight hour in mirkest glen,
I’d rove and ne’er be eerie, O,
If thro’ that glen I gaed to thee,
My ain kind dearie, O!
Altho’ the night were ne’er sae wild,
And I were ne’er sae weary, O,
I’ll meet thee on the lea-rig,
My ain kind dearie, O.
The hunter lo’es the morning sun
To rouse the mountain deer, my jo;
At noon the fisher takes the glen
Adown the burn to steer, my jo;
Gie me the hour o’ gloamin grey –
It maks my heart sae cheery, O,
To meet thee on the lea-rig,
My ain kind dearie, O!
William Reid (1764–1831), a Glasgow bookseller and a friend and admirer of Burns,
also wrote his version of “My Ain Kind Dearie, O”.
He used Fergusson’s first twp stanzas and then added his own.
At gloamin, if my lane I be,
Oh, but I’m wondrous eerie, O;
But mony a heavy sigh I gie,
When absent frae my dearie, O;
But, seated ‘neath the milk-white thorn,
In e’ening fair and clearie, O;
Enraptur’d, a’ my cares I scorn,
Whan wi’ my ain kind dearie, O.
Whare thro’ the birks the burnie rows,
Aft ha’e I sat fu’ cheerie, O;
Upon the bonny greensward howes,
Wi’ thee, my kind dearie, O;
I’ve courted till I’ve heard the craw,
Of honest chanticleerie, O;
Yet never mist my sleep ava,
When wi’ my kind dearie, O.
For tho’ the night were ne’er sae dark,
And I were ne’er sae wearie, O,
I’d meet thee on the lea-rig,
My ain kind dearie, O.
While in this wearie warld of wae,
This wilderness sae drearie, O;
What makes me blythe, and keeps me sae?
'Tis thee, my kind dearie, O.
A “lea-rig” is a grassy field, an unploughed rig or ridge.
From “Scotland Dances”, by Eugenia (Jeannie) Callander Sharp
(Used by permission.)