by Peter Thomson
Quhit’ll ye dae wi yon herrins heids?
Quhit’ll ye dae wi yon herrins heids?
We’ll makkit thon in tae laifs o breid
An aa manner o things.
So starts a song sung by the gutting gangs of the NE of Scotland in times when the silver darlings swam in shoals up to 30 miles long as they migrated around the Scottish coast. The song itself is a nonsense song. The lassies who sang it did so to help while away the hours of repetitive work gutting, salting and packing herring.