The Glenbuchat Image Library
No: 729 Contributor: No Contributor Year: 1869
86 The Whistle by James Wattie 1869Peoples Journal 1869
“In the course of last autumn, the publishers of the People's Journal, with a view to develop and foster a taste for literary recreations among the industrial classes, offered a series of pecuniary prizes for original compositions in the shape of Tales, Poems, and Juvenile Letters. Twelve prizes being allotted to each department. Stimulated less by the pecuniary rewards held out to them, for these were but of small value, than by a generous ambition to excel, a host of ardent aspirants crowded into the literary arena. In a few weeks there had been sent in a hundred and fifty six Tales. fifty seven Juvenile Letters. and four hundred and twenty poems.”
One of these poems was submitted by John Wattie of the Milton Glenbucket
THE WHISTLE
By John Wattie
Milton Glenbucket
When I was but a youth
I will tell you the truth
I thought I would play on the whistle, O
So I made up my mind
To see where I’d find
Some one that would lend me a whistle, O
I had a long nose
As you may suppose
So I soon found a friend wi’ a whistle, O
Which he said he would lend
If I only would mend
A splinter that was in his whistle, O
‘Twas a relation near
With fire hundred a year
Some one left him along with a whistle, O
I soon played a tune
And he knack d his auld thum’
And said “You may keep the auld whistle, O”
I was mad with delight
And I thanked him that night
As I twisted away at the whistle, O
And the tune roll’d along
Now right and now wrong
But it was not the fault of the whistle, O
My friend took a wife
To cherish his life
So his thoughts back return d to the whistle, O
He likewise got boys
Who of course must have toys
And he sent them to me for the whistle, O
O, alas it is true
Our days are but few
And such was the fate of the whistle, O
And I’ve oft been inclined
To give you my mind
Aye be sure to play on your ain whistle, O
Picture added on 25 January 2011 at 12:43
This picture is in the following groups
text
text