# Ballads/Heather Ale

HEATHER ALE.
HEATHER ALE: A GALLOWAY LEGEND.
From the bonny bells of heather They brewed a drink long-syne, Was sweeter far than honey, Was stronger far than wine. They brewed it and they drank it, And lay in a blessed swound For days and days together In their dwellings underground.
There rose a king in Scotland, 10A fell man to his foes, He smote the Picts in battle, He hunted them like roes. Over miles of the red mountain He hunted as they fled, And strewed the dwarfish bodies Of the dying and the dead.
​Summer came in the country, Red was the heather bell; But the manner of the brewing 20Was none alive to tell. In graves that were like children's On many a mountain head, The Brewsters of the Heather Lay numbered with the dead.
The king in the red moorland Rode on a summer's day; And the bees hummed, and the curlews Cried beside the way. The king rode, and was angry, 30Black was his brow and pale, To rule in a land of heather And lack the Heather Ale.
It fortuned that his vassals, Riding free on the heath, Came on a stone that was fallen And vermin hid beneath. Rudely plucked from their hiding, Never a word they spoke: A son and his aged father— 40Last of the dwarfish folk.
​The king sat high on his charger, He looked on the little men; And the dwarfish and swarthy couple Looked at the king again. Down by the shore he had them; And there on the giddy brink— "I will give you life, ye vermin, For the secret of the drink."
There stood the son and father 50And they looked high and low; The heather was red around them, The sea rumbled below. And up and spoke the father, Shrill was his voice to hear: "I have a word in private, A word for the royal ear.
"Life is dear to the aged, And honor a little thing; I would gladly sell the secret," 60Quoth the Pict to the King. His voice was small as a sparrow's, And shrill and wonderful clear: "I would gladly sell my secret, Only my son I fear.
​"For life is a little matter, And death is nought to the young; And I dare not sell my honor Under the eye of my son. Take him, O king, and bind him, 70And cast him far in the deep; And it 's I will tell the secret That I have sworn to keep."
They took the son and bound him, Neck and heels in a thong, And a lad took him and swung him, And flung him far and strong, And the sea swallowed his body, Like that of a child of ten;— And there on the cliff stood the father, 80Last of the dwarfish men.
"True was the word I told you: Only my son I feared; For I doubt the sapling courage That goes without the beard. But now in vain is the torture, Fire shall never avail: Here dies in my bosom The secret of Heather Ale."
NOTE TO HEATHER ALE.
Among the curiosities of human nature, this legend claims a high place. It is needless to remind the reader that the Picts were never exterminated, and form to this day a large proportion of the folk of Scotland: occupying the eastern and the central parts, from the Firth of Forth, or perhaps the Lammermoors, upon the south, to the Ord of Caithness on the north. That the blundering guess of a dull chronicler should have inspired men with imaginary loathing for their own ancestors is already strange: that it should have begotten this wild legend seems incredible. Is it possible the chronicler's error was merely nominal? that what he told, and what the people proved themselves so ready to receive, about the Picts, was true or partly true of some anterior and perhaps Lappish savages, small of stature, black of hue, dwelling underground—possibly also the distillers of some forgotten spirit? See Mr. Campbell's Tales of the West Highlands.