Her lover he put his horne to his mouth, 150 I pray thee, hold thy hand, "Nowe hold thy hand, thou bold Baròn, Nor ruthless rend two gentle hearts, 155 "My mother she was an earles daughtèr, And a noble knyght my sire 165 The baron he frownde, and turnde away The baron he stroakt his dark-brown cheeke, And turnde his heade asyde To whipe awaye the starting teare, He proudly strave to hyde. In deepe revolving thought he stoode, 185 And musde a little space; Then raisde faire Emmeline from the grounde, With many a fond embrace. "Here take her, Child of Elle,” he sayd, And gave her lillye hand; 190 "Here take my deare and only child, And with her half my lande. "Thy father once mine honour wrongde, "And as thou love her and hold her deare, Heaven prosper thee and thine; And nowe my blessing wend wi' thee, My lovelye Emmeline." 195 200 From the word kirke in ver. 159, this hath been thought to be a Scottish ballad; but it must be acknowledged that the line referred to is among the additions supplied by the Editor: besides, in the northern counties of England, kirk is used in the common dialect for church, as well as beyond the Tweed. XII. Edom o' Gordon, A SCOTTISH BALLAD, was printed at Glasgow, by Robert and Andrew Foulis, 1755, 8vo (twelve pages). We are indebted for its publication (with many other valuable things in these volumes) to Sir David Dalrymple, Bart., who gave it as it was preserved in the memory of a lady. The reader will here find it improved, and enlarged with several fine stanzas, recovered from a fragment of the same ballad, in the Editor's folio MS. It is remarkable that the latter is entitled Captain Adam Carre, and is in the English idiom. But whether the author was English or Scotch, the difference originally was not great. The English ballads are generally of the north of England, the Scottish are of the south of Scotland; and of consequence the country of ballad-singers was sometimes subject to one crown, and sometimes to the other, and most frequently to neither. Most of the finest old VOL. I. G Scotch songs have the scene laid within twenty miles of England; which is indeed all poetic ground, green hills, remains of woods, clear brooks. The pastoral scenes remain: of the rude chivalry of former ages, happily nothing remains but the ruins of the castles, where the more daring and successful robbers resided. The house or castle of the RODES, stood about a measured mile south from Duns, in Berwickshire some of the ruins of it may be seen to this day. The Gordons were anciently seated in the same county. The two villages of East and West Gordon lie about ten miles from the castle of the Rodes: the fact, however, on which the ballad is founded, happened in the north of Scotland (see p. 130). It contains but too just a picture of the violences practised in the feudal times all over Europe. From the different titles of this ballad, it should seem that the old strolling bards or minstrels (who gained a livelihood by reciting these poems) made no scruple of changing the names of the personages they introduced, to humour their hearers. For instance, if a Gordon's conduct was blameworthy in the opinion of that age, the obsequious minstrel would, when among Gordons, change the name to Car, whose clan or sept lay farther west, and vice versa. In the third volume the reader will find a similar instance. See the song of Gil Morris, the hero of which had different names given him, perhaps from the same cause. It may be proper to mention, that in the folio MS., instead of the "Castle of the Rodes," it is the "Castle of Brittons-borrow," and also "Diactoars," or "Dratours-borrow," for it is very obscurely written, and "Capt. Adam Carre" is called the "Lord of Westerton-town." Uniformity required that the additional stanzas supplied from that copy should be clothed in the Scottish orthography and idiom: this has therefore been attempted, though perhaps imperfectly. It fell about the Martinmas, Quhen the wind blew shril and cauld, "We maun draw to a hauld. "And quhat a hauld sall we draw till, 5 My mirry men and me? We wul gae to the house o' the Rodes, 10 To see that fair ladie." The lady stude on hir castle wa', Beheld baith dale and down; There she was ware of a host of men, Cum ryding towards the toun. 1 This ballad is well known in that neighbourhood, where it is entitled Adam o' Gordon. It may be observed, that the famous freebooter whom Edward the First fought with, hand to hand, near Farnham, was named Adam Gordon "O see ze nat, my mirry men a'? Methinks I see a host of men: She weend it had been hir luvely lord, She had nae sooner buskit hirsel, Till Edom o' Gordon and his men They had nae sooner supper sett, "I winnae give owre, ze fals Gordòn, To nae sik traitor as zee; And if ze brenn my ain dear babes, 50 My lord sall make ze drie. "But reach me hether my guid bend-bowe, Mine arrows one by one; For, but an I pierce that bluidy butcher, 55 My babes we been undone." She stude upon her castle wa', And let twa arrows flee; She mist that bluidy butchers hart, And only raz'd his knee. 60 "Set fire to the house," quo' fals Gordòn, All wood wi' dule and ire; "Fals lady, ze sall rue this deid, As ze brenn in the fire." "Wae worth, wae worth ze, Jock my man, 65 I paid ze weil zour fee; Quhy pow ze out the ground-wa' stane, Lets in the reek to me? "And ein wae worth ze, Jock my man, I paid ze weil zour hire; 70 Quhy pow ze out the ground-wa' stane, Sayes, "Mither deare, gi owre this house, For the reek it smithers me." 80 Verses 53, 54, and 58 "are restored from Foulis's edition, and the fo!. MS., which last reads the bullets, in ver. 58."-Percy. |