This was supposedly sung in London when James VI arrived from Edinburgh on the 1603 shuttle to claim the English crown.
I attended an excellent presentation by Leanda de Lisle at the Book Festival this morning. Although I'd sworn to severely limit book purchases this year I'm afraid that I gave way with this one. The Telegraph's man in Scotland, Alan Cochrane, asked Ms de Lisle whether there was a similarity between London's reaction to the arrival of James and his entourage and today's English feelings about the Scottish Raj. Answer: Yes.
The talk was chaired by BBC Scotland's political editor, Brian Taylor. He told us a good story. When he was covering the Robin Cook funeral Taylor complimented the Minister of St Giles on still using the King James Bible. The superb reply: "Well, he was one of our parishioners!"
(Brian Taylor also chaired last night's sell-out talk by Christopher Brookmyre. For those who don't know, Brookmyre's novels are full of black humour, chaotic events and mutual back-stabbings. How appropriate, therefore, to note the presence of the Scottish Tory leader in the row in front of me!)
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