Part 4

Another point of great importance in the matter of internal evidence, is the isolatedness of these ballads in respect of English traditionary literature. The Scottish muse has not always gone hand in hand with the English in point of time, but she has done so in all other respects. Any literature we had from the beginning of the seventeenth century downwards, was always sensibly tinged by what had immediately before been in vogue in the south. Nor is it easy to see how a people occupying part of the same island, and speaking essentially the same language, should have avoided this communion of literary taste; but the ballads in question are wholly unlike any English ballads. Look over Percy, Evans, or Mr Collier's suite of _Roxburghe Ballads_, giving those which were popular in London during the seventeenth century, and you find not a trace of the style and manner of these Scottish romantic ballads. Neither, it would appear, had one of them found its way into popularity in England before the time of Percy; for, had it been otherwise, he would have found them either in print or in the mouths of the people.[29]

[29] Robert Jamieson found in the _Koempe Viser_, a Danish collection of ballads published in 1695, one resembling the Scottish ballad of _Fair Annie_ (otherwise called _Lady Jane_), and on this ground he became convinced that many of our traditionary ballads were of prodigious antiquity, though they had been intermediately subjected to many alterations. Mr Jamieson's belief seems remarkably ill supported, and as it has never obtained any adherents among Scottish ballad editors, I feel entitled to pass it over with but this slight notice.

Upon all of these considerations, I have arrived at the conclusion, that the high-class romantic ballads of Scotland are not ancient compositions--are not older than the early part of the eighteenth century--and are mainly, if not wholly, the production of one mind.

Whose was this mind, is a different question, on which no such confident decision may for the present be arrived at; but I have no hesitation in saying that, from the internal resemblances traced on from _Hardyknute_ through _Sir Patrick Spence_ and _Gil Morrice_ to the others, there seems to me a great _likelihood_ that the whole were the composition of the authoress of that poem--namely, Elizabeth Lady Wardlaw of Pitreavie.

It may be demanded that something should be done to verify, or at least support, the allegation here made as to the peculiar literary character of the suspected ballads. This is, of course, a point to be best made out by a perusal of the entire body of this class of compositions, and scarcely by any other means. Still, it is a difference so striking, that even to present one typical ballad of true rustic origin, could not fail to make a considerable impression on the reader, after he has read specimens of those which are here attributed to a higher source. Be it observed, when an uneducated person speaks of knights, lords, and kings, or of dames and damosels, he reduces all to one homely level. He indulges in no diplomatic periphrases. It is simply, the king said this, and the lord said that--this thing was done, and that thing was done--the catastrophe or _denouement_ comes by a single stroke. This we find in the true stall-ballads. A vulgar, prosaic, and drawling character pervades the whole class, with few exceptions--a fact which ought to give no surprise, for does not all experience shew, that literature of any kind, to have effect, requires for its production a mind of some cultivation, and really good verse flowing from an uninstructed source is what never was, is not now, and never will be? With these remarks, I usher in a typical ballad of the common class--one taken down many years ago from the singing of an old man in the south of Scotland:

JAMES HATELIE.

It fell upon a certain day, When the king from home he chanced to be, The king's jewels they were stolen all, And they laid the blame on James Hatelie.

And he is into prison cast, And I wat he is condemned to _dee_; For there was not a man in all the court To speak a word for James Hatelie.

But the king's eldest daughter she loved him well, But known her love it might not be; And she has stolen the prison keys, And gane in and discoursed wi' James Hatelie.

'Oh, did you steal them, James?' she said; 'Oh, did not you steal them, come tell to me? For I'll make a vow, and I'll keep it true, You's never be the worse of me.'

'I did not steal them,' James he said; 'And neither was it intended by me, For the English they stole them themselves, And I wat they've laid the blame on me.'

Now she has hame to her father gane, And bowed her low down on her knee, 'I ask--I ask--I ask, father,' she said, 'I ask--I ask a boon of thee; I never asked one in my life, And one of them you must grant to me.'

'Ask on, ask on, daughter,' he said; 'And aye weel answered ye shall be; For if it were my whole estate, Naysaid, naysaid you shall not be.'

'I ask none of your gold, father, As little of your white monie; But all the asken that I do ask, It is the life of James Hatelie.'

'Ask on, ask on, daughter,' he said; 'And aye weel answered ye shall be; For I'll mak a vow, and keep it true-- James Hatelie shall not hanged be.'

'Another asken I ask, father; Another asken I ask of thee-- Let Fenwick and Hatelie go to the sword, And let them try their veritie.'

'Ask on, ask on, daughter,' he said; 'And aye weel answered you shall be; For before the morn at twelve o'clock, They both at the point of the sword shall be.'

James Hatelie was eighteen years of age, False Fenwick was thirty years and three; He lap about, and he strack about, And he gave false Fenwick wounds three.

'Oh, hold your hand, James Hatelie,' he said; 'And let my breath go out and in; Were it not for the spilling of my noble blood And the shaming of my noble kin.

'Oh, hold your hand, James Hatelie,' he said; Oh, hold your hand, and let me be; For I'm the man that stole the jewels, And a shame and disgrace it was to me.'

Then up bespoke an English lord, I wat but he spoke haughtilie: 'I would rather have lost all my lands, Before they had not hanged James Hatelie.'

Then up bespoke a good Scotch lord, I wat a good Scotch lord was he: 'I would rather have foughten to the knees in blood, Than they had hanged James Hatelie.'

Then up bespoke the king's eldest son: 'Come in, James Hatelie, and dine with me; For I'll make a vow, and I'll keep it true-- You'se be my captain by land and sea.'

Then up bespoke the king's eldest daughter: 'Come in, James Hatelie, and dine with me; For I'll make a vow, and I'll keep it true-- I'll never marrie a man but thee.'

Here is love, and here is innocence in difficulties--two things of high moral interest; yet how homely is the whole narration; how unlike the strains of the ballads which have been passed before the reader's view! And be it observed, the theory as to our ballads is, that they have been transmitted from old time, undergoing modifications from the minds of nurses, and other humble reciters, as they came along. If so, they ought to have presented the same plebeian strain of ideas and phraseology as _James Hatelie_; but we see they do not: they are, on the contrary, remarkably poetical, pure, and dignified.

Here I may, once for all, in opposition to Professor Aytoun and others, express my belief that the ballads in question are for the most part printed nearly, and, in some instances, entirely, in the condition in which they were left by the author. In _Edward_, I question if a line has been corrupted or a word altered. _Sir Patrick Spence_ and _Gilderoy_ are both so rounded and complete, so free, moreover, from all vulgar terms, that I feel nearly equally confident about them. All those which Percy obtained in manuscripts from Scotland, are neat finished compositions, as much so as any ballad of Tickell or Shenstone. Those from Mrs Brown's manuscript have also an author's finish clearly impressed on them. It is a mere assumption that they have been sent down, with large modifications, from old times. Had it been true, the ballads would have been full of vulgarisms, as we find to be the condition of certain of them which Peter Buchan picked up among the common people, after (shall we say) seventy or eighty years of traditionary handling. Now, no such depravation appears in the versions printed by Percy, Scott, and Jamieson.

It may be objected to the arguments founded on the great number of parallel passages, that these are but the stock phraseology of all ballad-mongers, and form no just proof of unity of authorship. If this were true, it might be an objection of some force; but it is not true. The _formulae_ in question are to be found hardly at all in any of the rustic or homely ballads. They are not to be found in any ballads which there is good reason to believe so old as the early part of the seventeenth century. They are to be found in no ballads which may even doubtfully be affiliated to England. All this, of course, can only be fully ascertained by a careful perusal of some large collection of ballads. Yet, even in such a case, a few examples may be viewed with interest, and not unprofitably. Of the plebeian ballads, a specimen has just been adduced. Let us proceed, then, to exemplify the ballads of the seventeenth century. First, take _Fair Margaret and Sweet William_, which Percy brought forward from a stall copy as, apparently, the ballad quoted in Fletcher's _Knight of the Burning Pestle_; though subjected to some alteration during the intermediate century and a half. It is as follows:

As it fell out on a long summer day, Two lovers they sat on a hill; They sat together that long summer day, And could not take their fill.

'I see no harm by you, Margaret, And you see none by me; Before to-morrow at eight o'clock, A rich wedding you shall see.'

Fair Margaret sat in her bouir window, Combing her yellow hair; There she spied sweit William and his bride, As they were a-riding near.

Then doun she layed her ivorie combe, And braided her hair in twain: She went alive out of her bouir, But never cam alive in't again.

When day was gone, and nicht was come, And all men fast asleip, Then came the spirit of fair Margaret, And stood at William's feet.

'Are you awake, sweit William?' she said; 'Or, sweit William, are you asleip? God give you joy of your gay bride-bed, And me of my winding-sheet!'

When day was come, and nicht was gone, And all men waked from sleip, Sweit William to his lady said: 'My deir, I have cause to weep.

'I dreimt a dreim, my dear ladye; Such dreims are never good: I dreimt my bouir was full of red swine, And my bride-bed full of blood.'

'Such dreims, such dreims, my honoured sir, They never do prove good; To dreim thy bouir was full of red swine, And thy bride-bed full of blood.'

He called up his merry-men all, By one, by two, and by three; Saying: 'I'll away to fair Margaret's bouir, By the leave of my ladye.'

And when he came to fair Margaret's bouir, He knockit at the ring; And who so ready as her seven brethren To let sweit William in.

Then he turned up the covering sheet: 'Pray, let me see the deid; Methinks, she looks all pale and wan; She hath lost her cherry red.

'I'll do more for thee, Margaret, Than any of thy kin, For I will kiss thy pale wan lips, Though a smile I cannot win.'

With that bespake the seven brethren, Making most piteous moan: 'You may go kiss your jolly brown bride, And let our sister alone.'

'If I do kiss my jolly brown bride, I do but what is right; I ne'er made a vow to yonder poor corpse, By day nor yet by night.

'Deal on, deal on, my merry-men all; Deal on your cake and your wine: For whatever is dealt at her funeral to-day, Shall be dealt to-morrow at mine.'

Fair Margaret died to-day, to-day, Sweit William died to-morrow; Fair Margaret died for pure true love, Sweit William died for sorrow.

Margaret was buried in the lower chancel, And William in the higher; Out of her breast there sprang a rose, And out of his a brier.

They grew till they grew unto the church-top, And then they could grow no higher; And there they tied in a true lovers' knot, Which made all the people admire.

Then came the clerk of the parish, As you the truth shall hear, And by misfortune cut them down, Or they had now been there.

Here, it will be observed, beyond the expression, 'my merry-men all,' there is no trace of the phraseology so marked in the group of ballads under our notice. Take, also, a ballad which, from the occurrences referred to, may be considered as antecedent to the epoch of _Hardyknute_, and we shall observe an equal, if not more complete, absence of the phraseology and manner of this class of ballads. It relates to a tragic love-story of 1631, as ascertained from the grave-stone of the heroine in the kirk-yard of Fyvie, Aberdeenshire:

Lord Fyvie had a trumpeter, His name was Andrew Lammie; He had the art to gain the heart Of Mill-o'-Tifty's Annie.

* * *

She sighed sore, but said no more, Alas, for bonny Annie! She durst not own her heart was won By the trumpeter of Fyvie.

At night when they went to their beds, All slept full sound but Annie; Love so opprest her tender breast, Thinking on Andrew Lammie.

'Love comes in at my bed-side, And love lies down beyond me, Love has possessed my tender breast, And wastes away my body.

'At Fyvie yetts there grows a flower, It grows baith braid and bonny; There is a daisy in the midst o' it. And it's ca'd by Andrew Lammie.

'O gin that flower were in my breast, For the love I bear the laddie, I wad kiss it, and I wad clap it, And daut it for Andrew Lammie.

'The first time I and my love met Was in the woods of Fyvie; His lovely form and speech so sweet Soon gained the heart of Annie.

'Oh, up and down, in Tifty's den, Where the burns run clear and bonny, I've often gone to meet my love, My bonny Andrew Lammie.

'He kissed my lips five thousand times, And aye he ca'd me bonny; And a' the answer he gat frae me, Was, "My bonny Andrew Lammie!"'

But now, alas! her father heard That the trumpeter of Fyvie Had had the art to gain the heart Of Tifty's bonny Annie.

And he has syne a letter wrote, And sent it on to Fyvie, To tell his daughter was bewitched By his servant, Andrew Lammie.

When Lord Fyvie this letter read, O dear, but he was sorry; 'The bonniest lass in Fyvie's land Is bewitched by Andrew Lammie.'

Then up the stair his trumpeter He called soon and shortly; 'Pray tell me soon what's this you've done To Tifty's bonny Annie?'

'In wicked art I had no part, Nor therein am I canny; True love alone the heart has won Of Tifty's bonny Annie.

'Woe betide Mill-o'-Tifty's pride, For it has ruined many; He'll no hae't said that she should wed The trumpeter of Fyvie.'

* * *

'Love, I maun gang to Edinburgh; Love, I maun gang and leave thee.' She sighed sore, and said no more, But, 'Oh, gin I were wi' ye!'

'I'll buy to thee a bridal goun; My love, I'll buy it bonny!' 'But I'll be dead, ere ye come back To see your bonny Annie.'

'If you'll be true, and constant too, As my name's Andrew Lammie, I shall thee wed when I come back, Within the kirk of Fyvie.'

'I will be true, and constant too, To thee, my Andrew Lammie; But my bridal-bed will ere then be made In the green kirk-yard of Fyvie.'

He hied him hame, and having spieled To the house-top of Fyvie, He blew his trumpet loud and shrill, 'Twas heard at Mill-o'-Tifty.

Her father locked the door at night, Laid by the keys fu' canny; And when he heard the trumpet sound, Said: 'Your cow is lowing, Annie.'

'My father, dear, I pray forbear, And reproach no more your Annie; For I'd rather hear that cow to low Than hae a' the kine in Fyvie.

'I would not for your braw new gown, And a' your gifts sae many, That it were told in Fyvie's land How cruel you are to me.'

Her father struck her wondrous sore, As also did her mother; Her sisters always did her scorn, As also did her brother.

Her brother struck her wondrous sore, With cruel strokes and many; He brak her back in the hall-door, For loving Andrew Lammie.

'Alas, my father and mother dear, Why are you so cruel to Annie? My heart was broken first by love, Now you have broken my bodie.

'Oh, mother dear, make ye my bed, And lay my face to Fyvie; There will I lie, and thus will die, For my love, Andrew Lammie.'

Her mother she has made her bed, And laid her face to Fyvie; Her tender heart it soon did break, And she ne'er saw Andrew Lammie.

When Andrew home from Edinburgh came, With mickle grief and sorrow: 'My love has died for me to-day, I'll die for her to-morrow.'

He has gone on to Tifty's den, Where the burn runs clear and bonny; With tears he viewed the Bridge of Heugh, Where he parted last with Annie.

Then he has sped to the church-yard, To the green church-yard of Fyvie; With tears he watered his true love's grave, And died for Tifty's Annie.

Let me repeat my acknowledgment that, while these extracts occupy more space than can well be spared, they form an imperfect means of establishing the negative evidence required in the case. But let the reader peruse the ballads of Buchan's collection known to relate to incidents of the seventeenth century, and he will find that they are all alike free from the favourite expressions of the unknown, or dimly known ballad-writer in question.

Let it never be objected that, if any one person living in the reigns of Queen Anne and George I. had composed so many fine poems, he or she could not have remained till now all but unknown. In the first half of the present century, there appeared in Scotland a series of fugitive pieces--songs--which attained a great popularity, without their being traced to any author. Every reader will remember _The Land of the Leal_, _Caller Herring_, _The Laird o' Cockpen_, _The Auld House_, and _He's ower the Hills that I lo'e weel_. It was not till after many years of fame that these pieces were found to be the production of a lady of rank, Carolina Baroness Nairn, who had passed through a life of seventy-nine years without being known as a song-writer to more than one person. It was the fate of this songstress to live in days when there was an interest felt in such authorships, insuring that she should sooner or later become known; but, had she lived a hundred years earlier, she might have died and left no sign, as I conjecture to have been the case with the author of this fine group of ballads; and future Burnses might have pondered over her productions, with endless regret that the names of their _authors_ were 'buried among the wreck of things that were.'

If there be any truth or force in this speculation, I shall be permitted to indulge in the idea that a person lived a hundred years before Scott, who, with his feeling for Scottish history, and the features of the past generally, constructed out of these materials a similar romantic literature. In short, Scotland appears to have had a Scott a hundred years before the actual person so named. And we may well believe that if we had not had the first, we either should not have had the second, or he would have been something considerably different, for, beyond question, Sir Walter's genius was fed and nurtured on the ballad literature of his native country. From his _Old Mortality_ and _Waverley_, back to his _Lady_ _of the Lake and Marmion_; from these to his _Lay of the Last Minstrel_; from that to his _Eve of St John_ and _Glenfinlas_; and from these, again, to the ballads which he collected, mainly the produce (as I surmise) of an individual precursor, is a series of steps easily traced, and which no one will dispute. Much significance there is, indeed, in his own statement, that _Hardyknute_ was the first poem he ever learned, and the last he should forget. Its author--if my suspicion be correct--was his literary foster-mother, and we probably owe the direction of his genius, and all its fascinating results, primarily to her.