Alastair Buchan

LIEUTENANT, ROYAL SCOTS FUSILIERS WHO FELL AT ARRAS ON EASTER MONDAY 1917 UNDER HIS COUNTRY’S TRIUMPHING FLAG

Since there are many variants of our northern speech, it seems fitting to say that the Scots pieces in this little collection are written in the vernacular which is spoken in the hill country of the Lowlands, from the Cheviots to Galloway. Scots has never been to me a book-tongue; I could always speak it more easily than I could write it; and I dare to hope that the faults of my verses, great as they are, are not those of an antiquarian exercise.

J. B.