When simmer cleeds the varied scene
Wi' licht o' gowd and leaves o' green,
I fain would be where aft I've been
At the foot o' Bennachie.

When autumn's yellow sheaf is shorn,
And barn-yards stored wi' stooks o' corn,
'Tis blithe to toom the clyack horn
At the foot o' Bennachie.

When winter winds blaw sharp and shrill
O'er icy burn and sheeted hill,
The ingle neuk is gleesome still
At the foot o' Bennachie.

Though few to welcome me remain,
Though a' I loved be dead and gane,
I'll back, though I should live alane,
To the foot o' Bennachie.

Oh, gin I were where Gadie rins,
Where Gadie rins, where Gadie rins--
Oh, gin I were where Gadie rins
By the foot o' Bennachie.

FOOTNOTES:

[13] The chorus of this song, which is said to have been originally
connected with a plaintive Jacobite ditty, now lost, has suggested
several modern songs similar in manner and sentiment. Imlah composed two
songs with this chorus. The earlier of these compositions appears in the
"May Flowers." It is evidently founded upon a rumour, which prevailed in
Aberdeenshire during the first quarter of the century, to the effect,
that a Scottish officer, serving in Egypt, had been much affected on
hearing a soldier's wife _crooning_ to herself the original words of the
air. We have inserted in the text Imlah's second version, as being
somewhat smoother in versification. It is the only song which we have
transcribed from his volume, published in 1841. But the most popular
words which have been attached to the air and chorus were the
composition of a student in one of the colleges of Aberdeen, nearly
thirty years since, who is now an able and accomplished clergyman of the
Scottish Church. Having received the chorus and heard the air from a
comrade, he immediately composed the following verses, here printed from
the author's MS.:--

Oh, an' I were where Gadie rins,
Where Gadie rins, where Gadie rins,
Oh, an' I were where Gadie rins,
At the back o' Bennachie!

I wish I were where Gadie rins,
'Mong fragrant heath and yellow whins,
Or, brawlin' doun the bosky lins
At the back o' Bennachie;

To hear ance mair the blackbird's sang,
To wander birks and braes amang,
Wi' friens and fav'rites, left sae lang,
At the back o' Bennachie.

How mony a day, in blithe spring