The Book of Scottish Song/Willie Winkie's Testament

Willie Winkie’s Testament.

[This curious old inventory of goods and chattels appears, with the above title, in Thomson's Orpheus Caledonius, 1725, but it is not given by Ramsay in his Tea-Table Miscellany.]

My daddy left me gear enough:
A couter, and an auld beam-plough,
A nebbed staff, a nutting-tyne,
A fishing-wand with hook and line;
With twa auld stools, and a dirt-house,
A jerkenet, scarce worth a louse,
An auld pat, that wants the lug,
A spurtle and a sowen mug.

A hempen heckle, and a mell,
A tar-horn, and a weather's bell,
A muck-fork, and an auld peak-creel,
The spakes of our auld spinning-wheel;
A pair of branks, yea, and a saddle,
With our auld brunt and broken laddle,
A whang-bit, and a sniffle-bit:
Cheer up, my bairns, and dance a fit.

A flailing-staff, a timmer-spit,
An auld kirn and a hole in it,
Yarn-winnles, and a reel,
A fetter-lock, a trump of steel,
A whistle, and a tup-horn spoon,
Wi' an auld pair o' clouted shoon,
A timmer spade, and a gleg shear,
A bonnet for my bairns to wear.

A timmer tongs, a broken cradle,
The pinion of an auld car-saddle,
A gullie-knife, and a horse-wand,
A mitten for the left hand,
With an auld broken pan of brass,
With an auld hyeuk for cutting grass,
An auld band, and a hoodling-how,
I hope, my bairns, ye're a' weel now.

Aft have I borne ye on my back,
With a' this riff-raff in my pack;
And it was a' for want of gear,
That part me steal Mess John's grey mare:
But now, my bairns, what ails ye now,
For ye ha'e naigs enough to plow;
And hose and shoon fit for your feet,
Cheer up, my bairns, and dinna greet.

Then with mysel' I did advise,
My daddie's gear for to comprise;
Some neighbours I ca'd in to see
What gear my daddy left to me.
They sat three-quarters of a year,
Comprising of my daddy's gear;
And when they had gi'en a' their votes,
'Twas scarcely a' worth four pounds Scots.

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