I’ve just started reading “Diaries of a Dying” man by William Soutar (1898-1943), a Scottish poet of whom, I must confess, I had never heard. He spent the last 15 years of his life in bed, and his diaries are an account of those years with many thoughts thrown in. I plan to read his poems, but what struck me this morning was his comment on reading “The Northern Muse,” an anthology of poems compiled by John Buchan: “ A fine anthology—yet one must admit that our greatest poems are ballads by unknown men.” I have had exactly the same thought on reading my way through “The Rattle Bag”: it’s the poems by “anon” that are the best. Perhaps it’s because those poems are not by one person but are honed and perfected by many, some of them women (a thought that perhaps didn’t occur to Soutar or perhaps, as was the custom until a few years ago, he wrote “men” to mean “everybody, including women.)

Anyway, I’ve been prompted to dig out “Sir Patrick Spens,” perhaps the best known of the Scottish ballads. I studied it at school and have remembered the first verse all my life, a sure mark of a great poem. I was intrigued to read the lines ‘A saw the new muin late yestreen

Wi the auld muin in her airm’: I was sure that was a line from Keats. The ballad says so much with such economy and romps along. I prompted to reread other Scottish ballads

The King sits in Dunferline toun,

Drinkin the blude-reid wine

‘O whaur will A get a skeely skipper

Tae sail this new ship o mine?’

O up and spak an eldern knight,

Sat at the king’s richt knee;

‘Sir Patrick Spens is the best sailor

That ever sailt the sea.’

Our king has written a braid letter

And sealed it wi his hand,

And sent it to Sir Patrick Spens,

Wis walkin on the strand.

‘Tae Noroway, to Noroway,

Tae Noroway ower the faem;

The King’s dauchter o Noroway,

Tis thou maun bring her hame.’

The first word that Sir Partick read

Sae loud, loud laucht he;

The neist word that Sir Patrick read

The tear blindit his ee.

‘O wha is this has duin this deed

An tauld the king o me,

Tae send us out, at this time o year,

Tae sail abuin the sea?

‘Be it wind, be it weet, be it hail, be it sleet,

Our ship maun sail the faem;

The King’s dauchter o Noroway,

Tis we maun fetch her hame.’

They hoystit their sails on Monenday morn,

Wi aw the speed they may;

They hae landit in Noroway

Upon a Wodensday.

‘Mak ready, mak ready, my merry men aw!

Our gude ship sails the morn.’

‘Nou eer alack, ma maister dear,

I fear a deadly storm.’

‘A saw the new muin late yestreen

Wi the auld muin in her airm

And gif we gang tae sea, maister,

A fear we’ll cam tae hairm.’

They hadnae sailt a league, a league,

A league but barely three,

When the lift grew dark, an the wind blew loud

An gurly grew the sea.

The ankers brak, an the topmaist lap,

It was sic a deadly storm.

An the waves cam ower the broken ship

Til aw her sides were torn.

‘Go fetch a web o silken claith,

Anither o the twine,

An wap them into our ship’s side,

An let nae the sea cam in.’

They fetcht a web o the silken claith,

Anither O the twine,

An they wappp’d them roun that gude ship’s side,

But still the sea cam in.

O laith, laith were our gude Scots lords

Tae weet their cork-heelt shuin;

But lang or aw the play wis playd

They wat their hats abuin.

And mony wis the feather bed

That flattert on the faem;

And mony wis the gude lord’s son

That never mair cam hame.

O lang, lang may the ladies sit,

Wi their fans intae their hand,

Afore they see Sir Patrick Spens

Come sailin tae the strand!

And lang, lang may the maidens sit

Wi their gowd kames in their hair,

A-waitin for their ane dear loes!

For them they’ll see nae mair.

Half-ower, half-ower to Aberdour,

Tis fifty fathoms deep;

An there lies gude Sir Patrick Spens,

Wi the Scots lords at his feet!