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NEFA
1994.044.01 Transcription
P: Murray Smythe
T: Local songs about local people
S: [Cont. from last item on 1994.043.] Remembers songs being
made in the bothys, just spur of the moment things. The more established
ones perhaps got printed and standardised.
NEFA
1994.044.02 Transcription
P: Murray Smythe
T: Peat cutting
S: The farm servants would cut the peat for the farm. MS used
to cut peats in Lonmay. The peats would be cut, stacked in rickles
and then carted back to the farm. Caithness peat is quite different
in shape: horizontally cut as the peat was shallower. You would
need about four days' cutting for a small house.
NEFA
1994.044.03 Transcription
P: Murray Smythe
T: Moving to Africa and MS's father
S: Father was a wanderer in his young days. Joined Australian
infantry, finished as Sergeant Major. He was in Gallipoli, Egypt
and France.
NEFA
1994.044.04 Transcription
P: Murray Smythe
T: MS in West Africa
S: Worked in the Gambia to increase rice production. Was to
go to university but work came up.
NEFA
1994.044.05 Transcription
P: Murray Smythe
T: Never made songs himself
S: Never made songs when he was working abroad, no one would
have understood the dialect.
NEFA
1994.044.06 Transcription
P: Murray Smythe
T: Father's book of poetry
S: MS's father made a book of poetry, Bitties fae Barrasgate,
that his mother had printed in 1969. Introduction by J. M. Bulloch.
NEFA
1994.044.07 Transcription
P: Murray Smythe
T: O Warldly Praise
FL: O warldly praise I crave ney mean
S: Introductory verse to father's book of poems.
NEFA
1994.044.08 Transcription
P: Murray Smythe
T: There wis Never Such a Bletherskite
FL: There never wis a bletherskite like Crafter James o Barrasgate
S: Father's own epitaph in his book of poems.
NEFA
1994.044.09 Transcription
P:
Murray Smythe
T: Adam and the Threshing Mill
FL: Adam's ower tae gie us a day and show us what he's made-o
S: Bothy poem by MS's father on a threshing machine. This one
has been done on the BBC.
NEFA
1994.044.10 Transcription
P:
Murray Smythe
T: The Sa't
FL: Fan miser Toon's pig wis smoort amon glaur
S: Poem about a filthy pig by MS's father.
NEFA
1994.044.11 Transcription
P: Murray Smythe
T: Sandy o Nethermill (Files)
FL: When Sandy left the ??, the oor hid struck eleven
S: Poem by MS's father on a drunken beadle. [End of Side A.]
NEFA
1994.044.12 Transcription
P: Murray Smythe
T: Seein's Believin
FL: Awa far up in Foudland's Glen lived Bell McNeill a widow
wife
S: Poem by MS's father about a lass who thought she saw a devil.
NEFA
1994.044.13 Transcription
P:
Murray Smythe
T: The Coo Rins Aff
FL: The hummel coo run aff ae day
S: Poem about a runaway cow by MS's father.
NEFA
1994.044.14 Transcription
P: Murray Smythe
T: Remembers father writing poems
S: He has a suitcase full of his father's writings. Robbie Shepherd
was interested in them.
NEFA
1994.044.15 Transcription
P: Murray Smythe
T: Fit Country Cradled Adam
FL: I see there is some little doot fit country cradled Adam
S: Poem by MS's father. The ark was moored at Clachnaben.
NEFA
1994.044.16 Transcription
P: Murray Smythe
T: McKlusky's Lament
FL: A piper stood by a muckle grey steen, the sa't tear blint
his ee
S: Poem about a pensioner by MS's father.
NEFA
1994.044.17 Transcription
P: Murray Smythe
T: Thanks and goodbye
S: Some of his father's poems were turned into sketches. He
has a few copies of his father's book of poems.
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