The Beggarman

Child #279, The Gaberlunzie Man, first printed in Ramsey's Tea-Table Miscellany, 1724.
In similar versions of this story, the beggarman is a nobleman or king in disguise. But in this one, he surely is a beggar, because he knows how to rant and sing.

A "lea" is a meadow. A change-up on the more common attitude in Scots folk song? "Maids, when you're young, never wed an old man."