I've a wonderful story to tell,
Gin
folk wad but listen to me;
Though I speak from
my horrible cell,
That ance lay at the grund
o' the sea.
I'm noo on the bree o' the hill,
For my house has been drifted about,
By
the winds and the waves at their will
Yet I never
could find my way out.
O, I am a merry
old Toad, etc. Ben Nevis it ance was
my hame,
Though noo I'm on Berwick Law tap;
I hae rambled thro' flood and thro' flame,
Without
ony serious mishap.
Two thousand land years and
mair
Hae baith seen the bloom an' the bud
Sin' I was shut in frae the air,
In
my smug little dungeon o' mud.
O, I am
a merry old Toad, etc. I hae feasted on
little sin' then,
An' I'm ready to gie my aith
Before ony body o' men,
That
I've scarcely e'en drawn my breath.
The very
last meal that I gobbled
Was a worm an inch in
length
Yet Nature my frame has sae cobbled
That I never hae failed in my strength.
O, I am a merry old Toad, etc. 'Tis true
that I'm fond o' the dark
Yet I sigh for the
light o' the day;
An' the mellow toned notes
o' the lark,
When it sings in the morn's first
ray.
Yet I think I hae 'scaped mony ills
Sin' I cam to this honeyless hive
For
here there's naething that kills,
If there's
naething to keep me alive.
O, I am a merry
old Toad, etc. | Some chiel wi' a
big knappin' hammer,
Ae day ga'e my stane sic
a fell,
That I raised sic a horrible clamour,
He e'en thought it was Sawney himsel';
He
fledó but the hammer he drappit,
With whilk he
was breakin' my stane;
Syne my stane I row'd
on the tap o'tó
An' noo it's a fossil remain.
O, I am a merry old Toad, etc.
The hills and the howes hae aft flitted,
Like
toads on the breast o' a pool,
Sin' round me
my prison was fitted,
Without ony compass or
rule.
Terodactyles an' big reptile Fishes,
I've seen in their glory an' prime,
Wha
aft on my frien's made sic dishes,
As perished
a tribe at a time.
O, I am a merry old
Toad, etc. Great mammoths wi' bodies prodigious,
I've seen on the face o' the yirth,
And
Krakins sae fearfu' an' hideous,
That shook the
hale warld in their mirth.
Aligators wi' teeth
like a whittle,
An' tails that could wallop the
moon,
Wi' skins like the hardest o' metal,
To hap their big bodies a'roun'.
O, I am a merry old Toad, etc. Mony things
I hae seen unrelated,
Lang syne when I wandered
abroad,
An' a story may not be inflated,
Though it's told by a hard livin' toad.
An'
those who are anxious to hear themó
Strange things
o' the times that are gane,
May come when they've
time, an' just speer them,
An' lay their lugs
close to my stane.
O, I am a merry old
Toad, etc. |
