The Weary Pund O Tow
written in 1792
The Weary Pund O Tow - meaning Summary
Domestic Frustration in Verse
This short comic lyric records a farmer-husband’s exasperation with his wife’s failure to spin tow (coarse flax). The repeated refrain emphasizes slow, unfinished domestic labor while small scenes — a bottle, a broken rock, a quarrel that becomes physical — turn a household chore into farce. The speaker alternates mock concern and anger, threatening action but mostly voicing humorous grievance. The poem sketches rural domestic life and gendered expectations through dialect, repetition, and escalating comic incidents rather than serious moral judgment.
Read Complete AnalysesThe weary pund, the weary pund, The weary pund o' tow; I think my wife will end her life, Before she spin her tow. I bought my wife a stane o' lint, As gude as e'er did grow, And a' that she has made o' that Is ae puir pund o' tow. There sat a bottle in a bole, Beyont the ingle low; And aye she took the tither souk, To drouk the stourie tow. Quoth I, For shame, ye dirty dame, Gae spin your tap o' tow! She took the rock, and wi' a knock, She brak it o'er my pow. At last her feet - I sang to see't! Gaed foremost o'er the knowe, And or I wad anither jad, I'll wallop in a tow. The weary pund, the weary pund, The weary pund o' tow; I think my wife will end her life, Before she spin her tow.
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