Annotation:Mrs. Dundas McQueen
X:1 T:Mrs. Dundas McQueen’s Reel M:C L:1/8 R:Reel B:James Aird – Selection of Scotch, English, Irish and Foreign Airs, vol. 5 B:(Glasgow, 1801, No. 144, p. 54) Z:AK/Fiddler’s Companion K:G c|OBGd>B cAeA|BGdB (de/f/) gd|BGdB cAeA|1 BG (B/c/d) e2 dg:|2 BG G/G/G e2 (d/e/f)|| g>edB cAeA|g/f/e/f/ gd e2 (d/e/f)|gedB cAeA|BG G/G/G e2 (d/e/f)| gedB cAeA|g/f/e/f/ gd e2 (d/e/f)|g>edB cAeA|(B/c/d) (e/f/g) decdO||
MRS. DUNDAS McQUEEN. AKA - "Mrs. Dundas McQuiens Reel." AKA and see "De'el's Dead," "Niel Gow's Wife (2)." Scottish, Reel (whole or cut time). A Major. Standard tuning (fiddle). AB (Petrie): AAB (Athole): AABB' (Kerr). Robert Dundas McQueen of Braxfield, was the son of Scottish advocate and notorious judge Robert MacQueen, Lord Braxfield, whose reputation for vileness continues to this day for his harshness in dealing with those who appeared before him, most famously in telling a defendant that "Ye're a vera clever chiel, man, but ye wad be nane the waur o' a hanging". He openly held the view that only those with landed interests had a right to be represented. His son was groomed for the bar as well, but chose not to practice. He married in 1796 Lady Lilias Montgomerie (c. 1775-1845), youngest daughter of Hugh Montgomerie (1739-1819), 12th Earl of Eglington, Robert Burns's "Sodger Hugh." A year after Robert died, in 1816, Lilias married Richard Alexander Oswald, a wealthy gentleman of Kilwinning, Ayrshire, for a time M.P. of Auchincruive. It was also his second marriage.
Versions of the tune can also be found as Francis Peacock's "Niel Gow's Wife (2)" (c. 1805), and the earlier "De'el's Dead," published in London by William Campbell. Campbell's tune is cognate, but not exact, and more similar in the first strain than the second.
