The Jolly Beggars : Sodger Laddie
written in 1785
The Jolly Beggars : Sodger Laddie - context Summary
Composed in 1785
Written in 1785 and included in The Merry Muses of Caledonia, this song-stage monologue features a bawdy female narrator who recounts a sequence of lovers drawn from military life. She moves between swaggering dragoons, a pious chaplain, and ragged veterans, treating romance as survival, amusement, and identity. The poem mixes humor, earthy sexuality, and sympathetic observation of soldiers’ precarious lives, reflecting Burns’s interest in popular song, convivial performance, and Scotland’s social-military world rather than formal lyric intimacy.
Read Complete AnalysesI once was a maid, tho' I cannot tell when, And still my delight is in proper young men; Some one of a troop of dragoons was my daddie, No wonder I'm fond of a sodger laddie, The first of my loves was a swaggering blade, To rattle the thundering drum was his trade; His leg was so tight, and his cheek was so ruddy, Transported I was with my sodger laddie. But the godly old chaplain left him in the lurch; The sword I forsook for the sake of the church: He ventur'd the soul, and I risked the body, 'Twas then I proved false to my sodger laddie. Full soon I grew sick of my sanctified sot, The regiment at large for a husband I got; From the gilded spontoon to the fife I was ready, I asked no more but a sodger laddie. But the peace it reduc'd me to beg in despair, Till I met old boy in a Cunningham fair, His rags regimental, they flutter'd so gaudy, My heart it rejoic'd at a sodger laddie. And now I have liv'd - I know not how long, And still I can join in a cup and a song; But whilst with both hands I can hold the glass steady, Here's to thee, my hero, my sodger laddie.
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