"The Taill of the Uponlandis Mous and the Burges Mous", also known as "The Twa Mice," is a Middle Scots adaptation of Aesop's Fable The Town Mouse and the Country Mouse by the Scottish poet Robert Henryson. Written around the 1480s, it is the second poem in Henryson's collection called The Morall Fabillis of Esope the Phrygian.
Hennryson's Fabill treats its characters and incidents with a realism that was hitherto unusual in the genre. Its ambiguous portrayal of the two protagonists seamlessly blends their animal and human characteristics in a way that allowed the makar to satirise new social classes in the rising burous touns of his day with subtle and philosophical irony.
Plot
The original fable plot is very simple. A town mouse visits a country cousin and is unimpressed at the poor quality of the fare. The town mouse invites the cousin back to her town house where the feasting is better. In town it is true that the food is better, more plentiful and very readily available, but the creatures are twice interrupted by inhabitants of the house. The country mouse does not stay to experience a third upset but returns home where the simple food can be enjoyed in peace.
Henryson's second fabill is highly faithful to Aesop's basic structure. His expansion creates fully fleshed scenes from each of the elements and heightens the drama in a number of different ways while remaining essentially concise.
Mous in Scots is pronounced with a short "oo" vowel, and Henryson's 15th-century spelling of the plural is myis.
Fabill
Henryson's fabill describes the two mice as sisteris and presents the difference in their lifestyles using human and economic terms that lend them ambiguous overtones. The Uponlandis Mous survives with difficulty like an owtlaw living on uther mennis skaith (lit. harm, in the sense of toil, suggesting the corn planted by farmers) and going hungry in winter. By contrast, the Burges Mous in town has it easy and lives a privileged life like a gild brother able to move freely all year but custum mair or les (i.e. without paying tax) among the cheis in ark and meill in kist. It is worth noting that just as Henryson blurs animal and human characteristics he also blurs the gender of the mice.
The taill features pictures of the mice travelling outside the city. When the Burges Mous decides to look for her sister, she sets out barefute, allone, with pykestaf in hir hand/ as pure pylgryme, and the image is of a lost figure in rugged terrain of uncertain vastness. Their journey back to town even has unlawful overtones (though quite natural for a mouse) as the pair sleep by day and move by night as if in violation of a curfew.
The fabill has two main scenes. The first is set in the sober wane of the Uponlandis Mous, described as a frail dwelling of moss and fern set under a steidfast stane. It features some highly believable dialogue as the two sisters fall out over the quality of the hospitality and is only eight stanzas long.
The second scene, with equally swiftly described action, takes place in a spence with vittell grit plentie (a well-stocked pantry) in a town house described as being not fer fra thyne (lit. not far from your place). The first figure to interrupt their feast is the spencer. Henryson departs from Aesop's original by allowing only the Burges Mous a hole in which to escape. Her sister, finding nowhere to go, lies flatlings on the ground in terror.
Visitation number two is a much more frightening development for the mice. After the spencer passes, the Burges persuades her reluctant sister to return to the burde, but
scantlie had thay drunkin anis or twyse
Quhen in come Gib Hunter, oure jolie cat... (lines 325-6)
This time the Uponlandis Mous is lucky to escape with her life. After much cruel handling from the cat, she manages to win free only by climbing up between ane parraling and the wall. After the cat has gone, the mous decries her sister's lifestyle and returns home.
Quhen scho wes furth and fre, scho wes ful fane, And merilie markit unto the mure. (Lines 355-6)
The fabill has a happy ending, but is qualified. The narrator reports in the final stanza only the rumour he has heard that the Uponlandis Mous lived happily ever after.