XII.
Reading edition
ON THE SAME.
[The second attempt did not in Burns’s fancy exhaust this fruitful subject: he tried his hand again.]
O Death, hadst thou but spared his life, Whom we this day lament, We freely wad exchang’d the wife, And a’ been weel content! Ev’n as he is, cauld in his graff, The swap we yet will do’t; Take thou the carlin’s carcase aff, Thou’se get the soul to boot.