And they have tane my three ky frae me.’
20.
20.5 ‘burden of batts,’ all the blows he can bear.
Quo’ Johnie Armstrong, ‘We’ll him hang;’
‘Nay,’ then quo’ Willie, ‘we’ll him slae;’
But up bespake another young man,
‘We’le nit him in a four-nooked sheet,
Give him his burden of batts, and lett him gae.’
21.
Then up bespake the good Laird’s Jock,