The Historic Town of Ayr

The Tam O' Shanter pub in the High Street.

At one time this was a museum dedicated to Burns and of course, the epic poem Tam O' Shanter written by Robert Burns, which tells the story of this sad hero, who, never taking his wife's advice, stays out at all hours, drinking his life away. It was at this hostelry Burns undoubtedly had Tam ensconced on the night of his impending encounter with the devil himself and the witches that rose from their graves to dance to the devil's bagpipes at the Auld Kirk in Alloway.

The poem was written in a day, so it is believed, to accompany an engraving of Kirk Alloway. The origins of the tale are in actual fact based on a person who actually lived, a farmer Douglas Graham of Shanter Farm, who was much given to getting drunk on market days. It was at his cousin's inn he would go to, indeed, he supplied his cousin with the malted barley they brewed there. Accompanying him on these days of merriment was his friend John Davidson, who became Souter Johnny in the poem.

What is a disputed though is the story behind the tale. The most likely being that Douglas Graham lost his bonnet one night, in the lining of which he had secreted the takings of the day's trade. To explain this to his wife he made up a story of how he was delayed by the sight of witches cavorting about the kirk and how when they spotted him, gave chase and his horse, thankfully, sped over the river before the witches caught him - but losing his bonnet in the process.

The other tale is that the men of Ayr, knowing he was inside getting 'unco fou', snipped off his mare's tail, and this too had to be explained away to his deeply suspicious, but also highly superstitious wife. This last one does have a ring of truth about it, but the former is the most quoted.

The brewery became known as the Tam O' Shanter in the 19th Century and was filled with Burns memorabilia, and reputedly the very seats that "Tam" and 'Johnny' sat on!

In more recent times the building became a museum, dedicated to Tam O' Shanter and Burns, but even more recently it was closed and re-opened as a pub once more.

So to the pub today then...

It really has to be visited if you are in Ayr, but don't be shocked to find that it is not some genteel throwback to ancient times, but a surprisingly lively, and often robust, place of modern day merriment! All manner of people drink and eat there, from the roughest of labourers to the most genteel of ladies, intermingled with bemused tourists from all around the world at the height of the tourist season (any time from Easter onwards).

It has it's fiercely loyal regulars who occupy the space of the bar nearest the fire (so don't stand there!) and they provide much of the hilarity and discussion found there both during the day and at night, when, similarly to Tam, they proceed to getting 'unco fou', but no mares await them, these days they take a taxi.

The pub serves very high quality meals, delivered from the restaurant next door, and at astonishingly reasonable prices. A dish you must try (apart from haggis) is their Cullen Skink. This is a soup made from cream and smoked fish, and although it stinks to high heaven, it is about the most wholesome, tasty and satisfying of meals imaginable. And theirs is very good indeed.

The place can at times be very busy indeed, especially if a fitba game is on the telly, or on race days when meets are held at the Ayr Racecourse. You are always assured a welcome here, and the locals really do love to talk about their town with you (or indeed, any subject you like!)

The staff are efficient and friendly and the place is a credit to their current owners, the McCowans.

Below I have reproduced the poem that gives the place its name...

TAM O' SHANTER
By Robert Burns


When chapmen billes leave the street,
And drouthy neebors, neebors meet,
As market-days are wearing late,
An' folk begin to tak the gate;
While we sit bousing at the nappy,
And getting fou and unco happy,
We think na on the lang Scots miles,
The mosses, waters, slaps, and styles,
That lie between us and our hame,
Whare sits our sulky sullen dame.
Gathering her brows like gathering storm,
Nursing her wrath to keep it warm.


This truth fand honest Tam o' Shanter,
As he frae Ayr ae night did canter,
(Auld Ayr, wham ne'er a town surpasses
For honest men and bonie lasses.)



O Tam! hadst thou but been sae wise,
As ta'en thy ain wife Kate's advice!
She tauld thee weel thou was a skellum,
A blethering, blustering, drunken blellum;
That frae November till October,
Ae market-day thou was nae sober;
That ilka melder, wi' the miller,
Thou sat as lang as thou had siller;
That every naig was ca'd a shoe on,
The smith and thee gat roaring fou on;
That at the Lord's house, even on Sunday,
Thou drank wi' Kirkton Jean till Monday.
She prophesied that late or soon,
Thou would be found deep drown'd in Doon;
Or catch'd wi' warlocks in the mirk,
By Alloway's auld haunted kirk.



Ah, gentle dames! it gars me greet,
To think how mony counsels sweet,
How mony lengthen'd, sage advices,
The husband frae the wife despises!



But to our tale:-- Ae market-night,
Tam had got planted unco right;
Fast by an ingle, bleezing finely,
Wi' reaming swats, that drank divinely
And at his elbow, Souter Johnny,
His ancient, trusty, drouthy crony;
Tam lo'ed him like a vera brither--
They had been fou for weeks thegither!
The night drave on wi' sangs and clatter
And ay the ale was growing better:
The landlady and Tam grew gracious,
The Souter tauld his queerest stories;
The landlord's laugh was ready chorus:
The storm without might rair and rustle,
Tam did na mind the storm a whistle.



Care, mad to see a man sae happy,
E'en drown'd himsel' amang the nappy!
As bees flee hame wi' lades o' treasure,
The minutes wing'd their way wi' pleasure:
Kings may be blest, but Tam was glorious.
O'er a' the ills o' life victorious!



But pleasures are like poppies spread,
You sieze the flower, its bloom is shed;
Or like the snow falls in the river,
A moment white, then melts for ever;
Or like the borealis race,
That flit ere you can point their place;
Or like the rainbow's lovely form
Evanishing amid the storm.--
Nae man can tether time or tide;
The hour approaches Tam maun ride;
That hour, o' night's black arch the key-stane,
That dreary hour he mounts his beast in;
And sic a night he taks the road in
As ne'er poor sinner was abroad in.



The wind blew as ‘twad blawn its last;
The rattling showers rose on the blast;
The speedy gleams the darkness swallow'd
Loud, deep, and lang, the thunder bellow'd:
That night, a child might understand,
The Deil had business on his hand.



Weel mounted on his gray mare, Meg--
A better never lifted leg--
Tam skelpit on thro' dub and fire;
Whiles holding fast his gude blue bonnet;
Whiles crooning o'er some auld Scots sonnet;
Whiles glowring round wi' prudent cares,
Lest bogles catch him unawares:
Kirk-Alloway was drawing nigh,
Whare ghaists and houlets nightly cry.



By this time he was cross the ford,
Whare, in the snaw, the chapman smoor'd;
And past the birks and meikle stane,
Whare drunken Chairlie brak ‘s neck-bane;
And thro' the whins, and by the cairn,
Whare hunters fand the murder'd bairn;
And near the thorn, aboon the well,
Whare Mingo's mither hang'd hersel'.--
Before him Doon pours all is floods;
The doubling storm roars thro' the woods;
The lightnings flash from pole to pole;
Near and more near the thunders roll:
When, glimmering thro' the groaning trees,
Kirk-Alloway seem'd in a bleeze;
Thro' ilka bore the beams were glancing;
And loud resounded mirth and dancing.



Inspiring bold John Barleycorn!
What dangers thou canst make us scorn!
Wi' tippeny, we fear nae evil;
Wi' usquabae, we'll face the devil!--
The swats sae ream'd in Tammie's noddle,
Fair play, he car'd na deils a boddle.
But Maggie stood, right sair astonish'd,
Till, by the heel and hand admonish'd,
She ventured forward on the light;
And, wow! Tam saw an unco sight
Warlocks and witches in a dance;
Nae cotillion brent-new frae France,
But hornpipes, jigs strathspeys, and reels,
Put life and mettle in their heels.
A winnock-bunker in the east,
There sat auld Nick, in shape o' beast;
A towzie tyke, black, grim, and large,
To gie them music was his charge:
He scre'd the pipes and gart them skirl,
Till roof and rafters a' did dirl.--
Coffins stood round, like open presses,
That shaw'd the dead in their last dresses;
And by some develish cantraip slight,
Each in its cauld hand held a light.--
By which heroic Tam was able
To note upon the haly table,
A murders's banes in gibbet-airns;
Twa span-lang, wee, unchristen'd bairns;
A thief, new-cutted frae a rape,
Wi' his last gasp his gab did gape;
Five tomahawks, wi blude red-rested;
Five scymitars, wi' murder crusted;
A garter, which a babe had strangled;
A knife, a father's throat had mangled,
Whom his ain son o' life bereft,
The gray hairs yet stack to the heft;



Three lawyers' tongues, turn'd inside out,
Wi' lies seam'd like a beggar's clout;
Three priests' hearts, rotten, black as muck,
Lay stinking, vile in every neuk.



Wi' mair o' horrible and awfu',
Which even to name was be unlawfu'.



As Tammie glowr'd, amaz'd, and curious,
The mirth and fun grew fast and furious;
The piper loud and louder blew;
The dancers quick and quicker flew;
They reel'd, they set, they cross'd, they cleekit,
Till ilka carlin swat and reekit,
And coost her duddies to the wark,
And linket at it her sark!



Now Tam, O Tam! had thae been queans,
A' plump and strapping in their teens,
Their sarks, instead o' creeshie flannen,
Been snaw-white seventeen hunder linnen!
Thir breeks o' mine, my only pair,
That ance were plush, o' gude blue hair,
I wad hae gi'en them off my hurdies,
For ae blink o' the bonie burdies!


But wither'd beldams, auld and droll,
Rigwoodie hags wad spean a foal
Louping and flinging on a crummock,
I wonder did na turn thy stomach!

But Tam kend what was what fu' brawlie:
There was ae winsome wench and wawlie,
That night enlisted in the core,
Lang after ken'd on Carrick shore;
(For mony a beast to dead she shot,
And perish'd mony a bonie boat,
And shook baith meikle corn and bear,
And kept the country-side in fear.)
Her cutty-sark, o' Paisley harn
That while a lassie she had worn,
In longitude tho' sorely scanty,
It was her best, and she was vauntie, - 
Ah! little ken'd thy reverend grannie,
That sark she coft for he wee Nannie,
Wi' twa pund Scots, ('twas a' her riches),
Wad ever grac'd a dance of witches!


But here my Muse her wing maun cour;
Sic flights are far beyond her pow'r;
To sing how Nannie lap and flang,
(A souple jade she was, and strang),
And how Tam stood, like ane bewitch'd,
And thought his very een enrich'd;
Even Satan glowr'd, and fidg'd fu' fain,
And hotch'd and blew wi' might and main;
Till first ae caper, syne anither,
Tam tint his reason thegither,
And roars out, "Weel done, Cutty-sark!"
And in an instant all was dark:
And scarcely had he Maggie rallied,
When out the hellish legion sallied.



As bees bizz out wi' angry fyke,
When plundering herds assail their byke;
As open pussie's mortal foes,
When, pop! she starts before their nose;
As eager runs the market-crowd,
When "Catch the thief!" resounds aloud;
So Maggie runs, the witches follow,
Wi' mony an eldritch skriech and hollo.



Ah, Tam! ah, Tam! thou'll get thy fairin'!
In hell they'll roast thee like a herrin'!
In vain thy Kate awaits thy commin'!
Kate soon will be a woefu' woman!
Now, do thy speedy utmost, Meg,
And win the key-stane o' the brig;
There at them thou thy tail may toss,
A running stream they dare na cross.
But ere the key-stane she could make,
The fient a tail she had to shake!
For Nannie, far before the rest,
Hard upon noble Maggie prest,
And flew at Tam wi' furious ettle;
But little wist she Maggie's mettle -
Ae spring brought off her master hale,
But left behind her ain gray tail;
The carlin claught her by the rump,
And left poor Maggie scarce a stump.



Now, wha this tale o' truth shall read,
Ilk man and mother's son take heed;
Whene'er to drink you are inclin'd,
Or cutty-sarks run in your mind,
Think! ye may buy joys o'er dear -
Remember Tam o' Shanter's mare.