Robert Burns Was a Dirty Boy

'Twas reading Bone Fires by Mark Jarman--a Christmas present from T--and after perusing "My Parents Have Come Home Laughing" had to check out a reference to a Robert Burns poem which I thought surely must have been a fiction--"Nine Inch Will Please a Lady."  But the miracle of Google proved that it was no fiction:

Nine Inch Will Please a Lady

(Robert Burns)

Come rede me dame, come tell me dame,

My dame come tell me truly,

What length o' graith when weel ca'd hame

Will sair a woman duly?"

The carlin clew her wanton tail,

Her wanton tail sae ready,

"l learn'd a sang in Annandale,

Nine inch will please a lady."

"But for a koontrie cunt like mine,

In sooth we're not sae gentle;

We'll tak tway thumb-bread to the nine,

And that is a sonsy pintle.

Oh, Leeze me on, my Charlie lad,

I'll ne'er forget my Charlie,

Tway roaring handfuls and a daud

He nidged it in fu' rarely."

But wear fa' the laithron doup

And may it ne'er be thriving,

It's not the length that makes me loup

But it's the double drivin.

Come nidge me Tom, come nidge me Tom

Come nidge me, o'er the nyvel

Come lowse an lug your battering ram

And thrash him at my gyvel!

graith=gear, equipment; clew=scratched, fondled;

tway thum-bread=two thumb-breadths; sonsy=healthy;

daud=a lump, a bit; laithron=lazy; doup=rump;

gyvel=gateway.

And the miracle of The You Tub proved that there were several performances of this song available-

Goodness gracious.  And he looked like such a genteel fellow.