Document 728
Mephistophelean Ballant-Scherzo on ane Fife Legend
Author(s): Tom Hubbard
Copyright holder(s): Tom Hubbard
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The toffee-nebbit cratur;
Aye on at me ti dae the wark
That’s richt agin my natur.
Says I, ‘You’re fir the warkin fowk –
Fine words, Faust! I’ll be blunter:
Thae schemes o yours are faur abune
The heid o your avrage punter.
‘Time wis, a stair that wad unrowe
As you’d gang up or doun;
A walin o my pliskiest deils
Paradin throu the toun;
‘Time wis, that saired the masses weill –
Christ! Hit wis aa they kent!
They’re better aff, but still they want
The-day’s equivalent.
‘Like bairns that, gie thaim wine or juice,
Be shair they’ll tak whit’s sweetest;
It’s as it wis and aye’ll be!
Faust, son, you’re an élitist!’
I tak the doktor doun the shore
And scoop intil his haund
Whit’s cheengeless as the fowk theirsel –
And common tae – the saund.
‘Leuk there’, says I, ‘fir nae twa grains
‘ll ever byde thegither;
Ilkane will think itsel unique
Though we canna tell ane frae the t’ither.’
This Faust says I’m a clever deil;
Mony a ferlie I’ve wrocht;
Is there some darg I canna dae?
He canna think o ocht.
‘I’m shair that Mephistopheles
Is the dabbest o dab haunds
At makkin me the finest raip
Frae the grains o Scotlan’s saunds.’
Weill! Hit’s eneuch ti gar the deil
Defect as last ti Gawd:
I wove, and still I better wove,
But the stuffie wadna haud.
Hit gars an honest deil ti wish
He’d bade at hame in Hell!
- Sae if Faust still wants his raip o saund,
He can dae’t his bluidy sel.
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APA Style:
Mephistophelean Ballant-Scherzo on ane Fife Legend. 2024. In The Scottish Corpus of Texts & Speech. Glasgow: University of Glasgow. Retrieved 11 December 2024, from http://www.scottishcorpus.ac.uk/document/?documentid=728.
MLA Style:
"Mephistophelean Ballant-Scherzo on ane Fife Legend." The Scottish Corpus of Texts & Speech. Glasgow: University of Glasgow, 2024. Web. 11 December 2024. http://www.scottishcorpus.ac.uk/document/?documentid=728.
Chicago Style
The Scottish Corpus of Texts & Speech, s.v., "Mephistophelean Ballant-Scherzo on ane Fife Legend," accessed 11 December 2024, http://www.scottishcorpus.ac.uk/document/?documentid=728.
If your style guide prefers a single bibliography entry for this resource, we recommend:
The Scottish Corpus of Texts & Speech. 2024. Glasgow: University of Glasgow. http://www.scottishcorpus.ac.uk.