1. |
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{{I’m going to buy you a fishing boat
Because I’m in love with you}}
Yes I am a young man
Yes I’ve got no money
But I can still get us
To Leith by sundown
When I first met you
I swore a solemn oath
That our life together
Would accumulate wealth
Listen, now for us
It’s a settler’s life
We’ll be happy when we’re eating
We won’t send the money home
It’ll take a few years
But by the end of this
We’ll have stripped the coast bare
And it’ll show in our clothes
The company of Scotland
For us all makes a stand
Take our place at Empire’s table
And laugh at the rest
I’ve it on good authority
This land is nowt but plenty
We won’t struggle for our penny
Start our rich family
{{I’m going to build you a fishing boat
Because I’m in love with you}}
I hope you don’t get seasick
It’d be rude to enquire
Don’t turn down my gestures
Don’t make me a liar
I think you should be glad
That I’m asking you at all
I am male: I make the decisions
And I take the fall
Your family’s wealth
Was greatly exaggerated
My lack of patience?
Severely exacerbated
I think you should stop
Right now and pack
Forget this happened
Darien and never look back
Fine, alright
I’ll go on my own
More wealth for me
You cannae sit on my throne
Look, I’m leaving
Good riddance to this
On my way to Edinburgh
I willnae write
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2. |
The piper's lament
02:18
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3. |
December the 25th, 1699
02:24
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From on board the 'Rising Sun' in Caledonia Bay, December 25th 1699
Our passage hither was very prosperous for the weather, but in other respects tedious and miserable. Our company very uncomfortable, consisting for the generality, especially the officers and volunteers of the warst of mankind, if yow had scummed the Land and raked to the borders of hell for them, men of lewd practises and venting the wickednesse of principles: for these things God was provoked to smite us very signally and severely with a contagious sickness which went through the the most part and cutt off by death about sixty of us on our ship and near a hundred on the rest of the fleet, the most since our departure from Montserrat. I cannot with this send you a particular list of the dead because I have not gathered them yet but the most lamented by the better part of us were Mr Alexander Dalgleish, minister, the Laird of Dunlop, Capt. Wallace engineer, and several others of the best sort. The means contributing to the encrease of this sickness and mortality were our too great crowds in every ship, straitening and stiffling one another, our chests of medicines ignorantly or knavishly filled and as ill-dispensed by our chirurgeons [surgeons], our water in wooden bound casks very unsavoury and unclean, our beef much of it rotten, many things redundant which were useless and many things needful wanting. It is a wonder of mercy that so many of us escaped and that at length we arrived at our part in safety tho in great sorrow three weeks agone by November 30. We had heard at Montserrat the colony was deserted but did not believe, tho some of us feared it all along. Arriving at this bay, we found the nest was flown. The ground that was cleared was all grown up again with Mangroves. The little fortification standing waste their batteries and huts all burnt doun (which some said was done by a Frenchman, others by an Englishman) and nothing of shipping there but two little sloups from New England and New York . . . They told us the Colony had deserted the 20th of June last for sickness (having destroyed themselves by working excessively on the fortifications) and for fear of want of provisions, that the St Andrew with her men was gone to Jamaica and the Unicorn and Caledonia to New York . . .
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4. |
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It was no great mischief to take us from our homes
No great mischief to put us on the boat
No great mischief to put us in a place
where people were dying in a stagnant pool
I have been on the wrong side of atrocity
I have slain and I am not worthy
Of the meagerest scraps of fish
But seriously, mate, this is taking the pish
Yous are Jacobean dreamers
Empire emulating schemers
Just cause they’re daein it down south
Doesn’t mean that we need to conquer to
Fill mouths of the screaming weans
What use is tobacco anyways?
All it burns is the mouth and the lungs
I canna sing the songs of home
______
I met a girl in Hamnavoe who’d seen it all before
She said the same thing to me when I’d went off to war,
“Don’t you see that time is a circle?
And that we are the circumference?”
I never really understood what that meant
I’d laughed it off as the ale talking
And, Lord, what ale that was
That northern scum really can drink
Ach, I dragged my weary pack to Leith
Promised: gold, riches but most of all adventure
I didn’t care much about repentance
But maybe I should’ve back then
It might’ve came in handy
Now I’m facing my maker
I could’ve done with some favour with the big man
But still sing the songs of back home
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5. |
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I wouldn’t be surprised if one of these days locusts don’t fall from the sky
I wouldn’t be surprised if one of these days the putrid river runs red with blood
Every day a purgatory, pushing all nature away, piling all the wood from the jungle to a fort
I want to know if I’m truly alive or if I’ll see heaven soon
None of the ships call in at our port to trade, we’re an isthmus-based pariah
600k raised by the company: they might have well set it all on fire
Trading potential irrelevant in torrential rain much like our ministers
You don’t have to be ordained to see the punishment in the bounty of the land, in the corpses piled high
The palour in the faces palpable, resignation in the eyes inevitable
The boats have cannibalised, veracity shot: all we tell are lies
Walk with leaden feet, collect more scraps of pity: the natives aren’t all that bad
The same can’t be said for the Spanish or the English: both are our tormentors, both are our nightmares.
Sunshine ray hope another expedition soon, they will augment our effort, our Sisyphean task
I hope they bring some ale, some respite from this world. I hope it’s the northern stuff: strong and hearty
If I can just manage one day more of struggle, effort and denial they will sail into shore
I hope this is the real life, even if this is purgatory, Lord, I can’t take any more
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6. |
Set it up
04:11
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Take a back seat and put your feet up baby
You’ve deserved it after the work we’ve done
We’ve given this isthmus the best year of our life
But now it’s time to pack up and flee
It’s time to trust ourselves to the sea
The next bastards who come will just have to cope with the mess we’ve left
Oh Lord I hope poseidon will be kind
I hope the company won’t mind the supplies we’ve left behind
I’ve spent a year scrabbling for air amend the dirt
This great vessel has become a dinghy
We should have left it in shape
So we can sail up the east coast
Through villages and towns
So let’s talk about greed for a second and
let’s talk about what we learnt
Henryson would have called this as the Moralitas of this fable
Empire build like a child with deathly legos
It all comes tumbling down, especially if you take the toys for yourself
And don’t share them around
We’ve had 300 years on the wrong side of history:
Aggressor, oppressor and worse
Independence again means nothing if we carry on as we were
Nothing if we carry on as we are
It is there, a chance to change what we can be
The potential for love, courage and empathy
Let’s grasp the thistle with both hands
Let’s sail this dinghy
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