Chapter VI: Appendix: II (3)

By the alteration of a few words, such as _gang_ for _go_, _toun_ for _town_, &c., "Oh Nanny, wilt thou gang with me?" was transposed into a Scotch song, and printed as such in Johnson's _Musical Museum_. Burns remarked on this insertion: "It is too barefaced to take Dr. Percy's charming song, and by the means of transposing a few English words into Scots, to offer it to pass for a Scots song. I was not acquainted with the editor until the first volume was nearly finished, else had I known in time I would have prevented such an impudent absurdity." Stenhouse, suggested[43] that Percy may have had in view the song called _The young Laird and Edinburgh Kate_, printed in Ramsay's _Tea-Table Miscellany_, the second stanza of which is somewhat similar--

"O Katy, wiltu gang wi' me,
And leave the dinsome town awhile?
The blossom's sprouting from the tree,
And a' the simmer's gawn to smile."

Mr. Charles Kirkpatrick Sharpe, however, hinted[44] that "perhaps both the author of _The Young Laird and Edinburgh Katy_, and the Bishop, took the idea of their ballads from a song in Lee's beautiful tragedy of _Theodosius, or the Force of Love_."

Dr. Rimbault communicated this poem to the editors of the folio MS. from a MS. dated 1682, or fifteen years earlier than Lee's version. It is called _The Royal Nun_, and the first stanza is as follows:--

"Canst thou, Marina, leave the world,
The world that is devotion's bane,
Where crowns are toss'd and sceptres hurl'd,
Where lust and proud ambition reign?
Canst thou thy costly robes forbear,
To live with us in poor attire;
Canst thou from courts to cells repair
To sing at midnight in the quire?"[45]

The likeness in this stanza to Percy's song is not very apparent, and the subject is very different. The other three stanzas have nothing in common with _O Nancy_. Even could it be proved that Percy had borrowed the opening idea from these two poems, it does not derogate from his originality, for the charm of the song is all his own.

A portrait of Mrs. Percy holding in her hand a scroll inscribed _Oh Nancy_, is preserved at Ecton House, near Northampton, the seat of Mr. Samuel Isted, husband of Percy's daughter Barbara.

The song was set to music by Thomas Carter, and sung by Vernon at Vauxhall in 1773.

In 1761 Percy commenced his literary career by the publication of a Chinese novel, _Hau Kiau Chooan_, in four volumes, which he translated from the Portuguese, and in the same year he undertook to edit the works of the Duke of Buckingham. In 1762 he published "Miscellaneous Pieces relating to the Chinese," and in 1763 commenced a new edition of Surrey's Poems, with a selection of early specimens of blank verse. The "Buckingham" and "Surrey" were printed, but never published, and the stock of the latter was destroyed by fire in 1808. In 1763 were published "Five Pieces of Runic Poetry--translated from the Icelandic Language," and in the following year appeared "A New Translation of the Song of Solomon from the Hebrew, with Commentary and Notes," and also "A Key to the New Testament." Dr. Johnson paid a long-promised visit to the Vicarage of Easton Maudit in the summer of 1764, where he stayed for some months, and the little terrace in the garden is still called after him, "Dr. Johnson's Walk." At this time Percy must have been full of anxiety about his _Reliques_, which were shortly to be published, and in the preparation of which he had so long been engaged. The poet Shenstone was the first to suggest the subject of this book, as he himself states in a letter to a friend, dated March 1, 1761. "You have heard me speak of Mr. Percy; he was in treaty with Mr. James Dodsley for the publication of our best old ballads in three volumes. He has a large folio MS. of ballads, which he showed me, and which, with his own natural and acquired talents, would qualify him for the purpose as well as any man in England. I proposed the scheme to him myself, wishing to see an elegant edition and good collection of this kind. I was also to have assisted him in selecting and rejecting, and fixing upon the best readings; but my illness broke off the correspondence in the beginning of winter."

In February, 1765, appeared the first edition of the _Reliques_, which gave Percy a name, and obtained for him the patronage of the great. He became Chaplain and Secretary to the Duke of Northumberland, with whose family he kept up intimate relations throughout his life. The Northumberland _Household Book_, which he compiled in accordance with the wishes of his patron, was privately printed in the year 1768.[46] In 1769 he was appointed Chaplain to George III., and in the following year appeared his translation of Mallet's _Northern Antiquities_. Each of these three works was the first of its class, and created a taste which produced a literature of the same character. The _Household Book_ gave rise to a large number of publications which have put us in possession of numerous facts relating to the domestic expenses and habits of the royal and noble families of old England. The mythology of the Eddas was first made known to English readers by Percy, and in his Preface to Mallet's work he clearly pointed out the essential difference between the Celtic and Teutonic races, which had previously been greatly overlooked.

The remuneration which Percy received for his labours was not large. Fifty pounds was the pay for the Chinese novel, and one hundred guineas for the first edition of the _Reliques_. The agreements he made with the Tonsons were fifty guineas for Buckingham's _Works_ and twenty guineas for Surrey's _Poems_. He also agreed to edit the _Spectator_ and _Guardian_, with notes, for one hundred guineas, but was obliged to abandon his intention on account of the engrossing character of his appointments in the Northumberland family.

About this time Mrs. Percy was appointed nurse to Prince Edward, the infant son of George III., afterwards Duke of Kent, and father of her present Majesty, who was born in 1767.

In 1770 Percy took his degree of D.D. at Cambridge, having incorporated himself at Emmanuel College, the master of which was his friend, Dr. Farmer, to be remembered as the Shakspere commentator. Later on in the year he lost his eldest daughter, and in January, 1771, yet another child was buried in the village church. In 1771 he printed the _Hermit_ _of Warkworth_, which exhibited his continued interest in the subject of the _Reliques_, and we find him for many years after this date continually writing to his literary correspondents for information relating to old ballads.

In 1778 Percy obtained the Deanery of Carlisle, which four years afterwards he resigned on being appointed to the bishopric of Dromore, worth _£_2,000 a year. He did not resign his vicarage and rectory until the same time, and he was succeeded in the first by Robert Nares, the compiler of the well-known glossary. It was in 1778 that the memorable quarrel between Percy and Johnson occurred which is graphically described by Boswell. The cause of the heat was the different views held by the two disputants as to the merits of the traveller Pennant. When the reconciliation was brought about Johnson's contribution to the peace was, "My dear sir, I am willing you shall hang Pennant."

In this same year Percy was writing about his son Henry, then a tall youth of fifteen, who he hoped in a few years would be able to edit the _Reliques_ for him, but in April, 1783, soon after he had settled at Dromore, a great sorrow fell upon him, and this only and much-loved son died at the early age of twenty. In 1780 a large portion of Northumberland House, Strand, was consumed by fire, when Percy's apartments were burnt. The chief part of his library, was, however, saved. Four very interesting letters of the bishop's, written to George Steevens in 1796 and 1797, are printed in the _Athenæum_ for 1848 (pp. 437 and 604). The first relates to his edition of Goldsmith's works, which was published in 1801 in four volumes octavo. His object in undertaking the labour was to benefit two surviving relations of Goldsmith, and he complains to Steevens that the publishers had thwarted him in his purpose. The second letter is on the same subject, and the third and fourth relate to his work on blank verse before Milton, attached to Surrey's Poems. In 1798 the Irish Rebellion broke out, and Percy sent a large quantity of correspondence and valuable books to his daughter, Mrs. Isted, for safe preservation at Ecton House. In 1806 his long and happy union with Mrs. Percy was abruptly brought to a close, and to add to his afflictions he became totally blind. He bore his trials with resignation, and ere five more years had passed by, he himself was borne to the tomb. On the 30th of September, 1811, he died in the eighty-third year of his age, having outlived nearly all his contemporaries.[47]

That his attachment to "Nancy" was fervent as well as permanent, is shown by many circumstances. One of these is a little poem printed for the first time in the edition of the folio MS.[48]

"ON LEAVING ---- ON A TEMPESTUOUS NIGHT,
MARCH 22, 1788, BY DR. PERCY.

"Deep howls the storm with chilling blast,
Fast falls the snow and rain,
Down rush the floods with headlong haste,
And deluge all the plain.

"Yet all in vain the tempest roars,
And whirls the drifted snow;
In vain the torrents scorn the shore,
To Delia I must go.

"In vain the shades of evening fall,
And horrid dangers threat,
What can the lover's heart appal,
Or check his eager feet?

"The darksome vale he fearless tries,
And winds its trackless wood;
High o'er the cliff's dread summit flies,
And rushes through the flood.

"Love bids atchieve the hardy task,
And act the wondrous part;
He wings the feet with eagle's speed,
And lends the lion-heart.

"Then led by thee, all-powerful boy,
I'll dare the hideous night;
Thy _dart_ shall guard me from annoy,
Thy _torch_ my footsteps light.

"The cheerful blaze--the social hour--
The friend--all plead in vain;
Love calls--I brave each adverse power
Of peril and of pain."

Percy had naturally a hot temper, but this cooled down with time, and the trials of his later life were accepted with Christian meekness. One of his relations, who as a boy could just recollect him, told Mr. Pickford "that it was quite a pleasure to see even then his gentleness, amiability, and fondness for children. Every day used to witness his strolling down to a pond in the palace garden, in order to feed his swans, who were accustomed to come at the well-known sound of the old man's voice." He was a pleasing companion and a steady friend. His duties, both in the retired country village and in the more elevated positions of dean and bishop, were all performed with a wisdom and ardour that gained him the confidence of all those with whom he was brought in contact. The praise given to him in the inscription on the tablet to his memory in Dromore Cathedral does not appear to have gone beyond the truth. It is there stated that he resided constantly in his diocese, and discharged "the duties of his sacred office with vigilance and zeal, instructing the ignorant, relieving the necessitous, and comforting the distressed with pastoral affection." He was "revered for his piety and learning, and beloved for his universal benevolence, by all ranks and religious denominations."

There are three portraits of Percy. The first and best known was painted by Reynolds in May, 1773. It represents him habited in a black gown and bands, with a loose black cap on his head, and the folio MS. in his hand. It is not known whether the original is still in existence, but engravings from it are common. The next was painted by Abbot in 1797, and hangs at Ecton Hall. Percy is there represented as a fuller-faced man, in his episcopal dress, and wearing a wig. We have Steevens's authority for believing this to be an excellent likeness. An engraving from it is prefixed to the "Percy Correspondence," in Nichols's _Illustrations of Literature_.

In the third volume of Dibdin's _Bibliographical Decameron_ is a beautiful engraving from a watercolour drawing, which represents the bishop in his garden at Dromore, when totally blind, feeding his swans.[49]

THE FOLIO MS. AND THE "RELIQUES."

What were the sources from which Percy obtained the chief contents of his celebrated work? They were:--1. The folio MS.; 2. Certain other MS. collections, the use of which he obtained; 3. The Scotch ballads sent to him by Sir David Dalrymple (better known by his title of Lord Hailes, which he assumed on being appointed one of the Judges of the Court of Session in Edinburgh); 4. The ordinary printed broadsides; 5. The poems he extracted from the old printed collections of fugitive poetry--_The Paradise of Dainty Devices, England's Helicon_, &c.

In considering the above sources, it will be necessary to give some little space to the discussion of the connection between the folio MS. and the _Reliques_, as it is not generally understood by the ordinary readers of the latter.

The folio MS. came into Percy's hands early in his life, and the interest of its contents first caused him to think of forming his own collection. One of the notes on the covers of the MS. is as follows:--

"When I first got possession of this MS. I was very young, and being no degree an antiquary, I had not then learnt to reverence it; which must be my excuse for the scribble which I then spread over some parts of its margin, and, in one or two instances, for even taking out the leaves to save the trouble of transcribing. I have since been more careful. T. P."

He showed it to his friends, and immediately after the publication of the _Reliques_ he deposited it at the house of his publishers, the Dodsleys, of Pall Mall. In spite of all this publicity, Ritson actually denied the very existence of the MS. Another memorandum on the cover of the folio was written on Nov. 7, 1769. It is as follows:--

"This very curious old manuscript, in its present mutilated state, but unbound and sadly torn, &c., I rescued from destruction, and begged at the hands of my worthy friend Humphrey Pitt, Esq., then living at Shiffnal, in Shropshire, afterwards of Priorslee, near that town; who died very lately at Bath (viz., in summer 1769). I saw it lying dirty on the floor, under a Bureau in ye Parlour: being used by the maids to light the fire. It was afterwards sent, most unfortunately, to an ignorant Bookbinder, who pared the margin, when I put it into Boards in order to lend it to Dr. Johnson. Mr. Pitt has since told me that he believes the transcripts into this volume, &c., were made by that Blount who was author of _Jocular Tenures_, &c., who he thought was of Lancashire or Cheshire, and had a remarkable fondness for these old things. He believed him to be the same person with that Mr. Thomas Blount who published the curious account of King Charles the 2ds escape intitled _Boscobel_, &c., Lond. 1660, 12mo, which has been so often reprinted. As also the _Law Dictionary_, 1671, folio, and many other books which may be seen in Wood's _Athenæ_, ii. 73, &c. A Descendant or Relation of that Mr. Blount was an apothecary at Shiffnal, whom I remember myself (named also Blount). He (if I mistake not) sold the Library of the said predecessor Thos. Blount to the above-mentioned Mr. Humphy Pitt: who bought it for the use of his nephew, my ever-valued friend Robt Binnel. Mr. Binnel accordingly had all the printed books, but this MS. which was among them was neglected and left behind at Mr. Pitt's house, where it lay for many years. T. PERCY."

Mr. Furnivall believes that the copier of the MS. must have been a man greatly inferior to Thomas Blount, who was a barrister of the Middle Temple, of considerable learning.

Percy afterwards kept the volume very much to himself, and Ritson affirmed that "the late Mr. Tyrwhitt, an excellent judge and diligent peruser of old compositions, and an intimate friend of the owner, never saw it."[50] Although Jamieson was obliged by receiving a copy of three of the pieces in the MS., he was not allowed a sight of the volume, and no one else was permitted to make any use of it. This spirit of secrecy was kept up by the bishop's descendants, who refused all who applied to see it. Sir Frederic Madden alone was allowed to print some pieces in his _Syr Gawayne_ for the Bannatyne Club, 1839. The public obtained a glimpse of its contents through Dr. Dibdin, who copied from Percy's list the first seventy-two entries, and would have finished the whole, had he not been stopped by his entertainers (Mr. and Mrs. Samuel Isted, of Ecton Hall), when they found out what he was about. He gave in his _Bibliographical Decameron_ a description of the MS. which he thus handled in the winter of 1815. Mr. Furnivall writes as follows of his several attempts to get the MS. printed, and of his success at last: "The cause of the printing of Percy's MS., of the publication of the book, was the insistence time after time by Professor Child, that it was the duty of English antiquarian men of letters to print this foundation document of English balladry, the basis of that structure which Percy raised, so fair to the eyes of all English-speaking men throughout the world. Above a hundred years had gone since first the _Reliques_ met men's view, a Percy Society had been born and died, but still the Percy manuscript lay hid in Ecton Hall, and no one was allowed to know how the owner who had made his fame by it had dealt with it, whether his treatment was foul or fair. No list even of its contents could be obtained. Dibdin and Madden, and many a man less known had tried their hands, but still the MS. was kept back, and this generation had made up its mind that it was not to see the desired original in type.... I tried to get access to the MS. some half-a-dozen years ago. Repulsed, I tried again when starting the Early English Text Society. Repulsed again, I tried again at a later date, but with the like result. Not rebuffed by this, Professor Child added his offer of _£_50 to mine of _£_100, through Mr. Thurstan Holland, a friend of his own and of the owners of the MS., and this last attempt succeeded." The less said the better about the conduct of these owners who were only to be tempted to confer a public benefit by the increased offers of two private gentlemen, but there cannot be two opinions about the spirited conduct of Mr. Furnivall and Professor Child. The three volumes[51] that the printed edition of the MS. occupy, form a handsome monument of well-directed labour. The text is printed with the most careful accuracy under the superintendence of Mr. Furnivall, and the elaborate prefaces which exhibit that union of judgment and taste for which Mr. Hales is so well known, leave nothing to be desired.

"The manuscript itself is a 'scrubby, shabby paper' book, about fifteen and a half inches long by five and a half wide, and about two inches thick, which has lost some of its pages both at the beginning and end.... The handwriting was put by Sir F. Madden at after 1650 A.D.; by two authorities at the Record Office whom I consulted, in the reign of James I. rather than that of Charles I., but as the volume contains, among other late pieces, one on the siege of Newark in Charles I.'s time (ii. 33), another on the taking of Banbury in 1642 (ii. 39), and a third, _The King inioyes his rights againe_, which contains a passage[52] that (as Mr. Chappell observes in _Pop. Mus._ ii. 438, note 2) fixes the date of the song to the year 1643, we must make the date about 1650, though rather before than after, so far as I can judge. I should keep it in Charles I.'s reign, and he died Jan. 30, 1649, but within a quarter of a century one can hardly determine.... The dialect of the copier of the MS. seems to have been Lancashire, as is shown by the frequent use of the final _st, thoust_ for _thou shalt, Ist_ for _I will, youst_ for _you will_, _unbethought_ for _umbethought_, and the occurrence of the northern terms, like _strang_, _gange_, &c. &c. Moreover, the strong local feeling shown by the copier in favour of Lancashire and Cheshire, and the Stanleys, in his choice of _Flodden Feilde_, _Bosworth Feilde_, _Earles of Chester_, _Ladye Bessiye_, confirms the probability that he was from one of the counties named. That much, if not all, of the MS. was written from dictation and hurriedly is almost certain, from the continual miswriting of _they_ for _the_, _rought_ for _wrought_, _knight_ for _night_ (once), _me_ fancy for _my_ fancy, _justine_ for _justing_."[53]

A very erroneous impression has grown up as to the proportion of pieces in the _Reliques_ which were taken from the MS. This is owing to a misleading statement made by Percy in his preface, to the effect that "the greater part of them are extracted from an ancient MS. in the editor's possession, which contains near two hundred poems, songs, and metrical romances." The fact is that only one-fourth were so taken. The _Reliques_ contain 180 pieces, and of these only forty-five[54] are taken from the manuscript. We thus see that a very small part of the manuscript was printed by Percy. He mentions some of the other pieces in various parts of his book, and he proposed to publish a fourth volume of the _Reliques_ at some future period that never came.

Mr. Furnivall has the following remarks on the gains to literature by the publication of the manuscript: "It is more that we have now for the first time _Eger and Grime_ in its earlier state, _Sir Lambewell_, besides the _Cavilere's_ praise of his hawking, the complete versions of _Scottish Feilde_ and _Kinge Arthur's Death_, the fullest of _Flodden Feilde_ and the verse _Merline_, the _Earle of Westmorlande_, _Bosworth Feilde_, the curious poem of _John de Reeve_, and the fine alliterative one of _Death and Liffe_, with its gracious picture of Lady dame Life, awakening life and love in grass and tree, in bird and man, as she speeds to her conquest over death."

In 1774 Percy wrote: "In three or four years I intend to publish a volume or two more of old English and Scottish poems in the manner of my _Reliques_." And again in 1778: "With regard to the _Reliques_, I have a large fund of materials, which when my son has compleated his studies at the University, he may, if he likes it, distribute into one or more additional volumes." The death of this son put an end to his hopes, but before the fourth edition was required, the bishop had obtained the assistance of his nephew, the Rev. Thomas Percy. In 1801 he wrote as follows to Jamieson, who had asked for some extracts from the folio: "Till my nephew has completed his collection for the intended fourth volume it cannot be decided whether he may not wish to insert himself the fragments you desire; but I have copied for you here that one which you particularly pointed out, as I was unwilling to disappoint your wishes and expectations altogether. By it you will see the defective and incorrect state of the old text in the ancient folio MS., and the irresistible demand on the editor of the _Reliques_ to attempt some of those conjectural emendations, which have been blamed by one or two rigid critics, but without which the collection would not have deserved a moment's attention."

Percy has been very severely judged for the alterations he made in his manuscript authorities; and Ritson has attempted to consider his conduct as a question of morality rather than one of taste. As each point is noticed in the prefaces to the various pieces, it is not necessary to discuss the question here. It may, however, be remarked that, in spite of all Ritson's attacks (and right was sometimes on his side), the _Reliques_ remain to the present day unsuperseded.

Mr. Thoms communicated to the _Notes and Queries_ (5th series, v. 431) the following note, which he made upwards of forty years ago, after a conversation with Francis Douce:--

"Mr. Douce told me that the Bishop (Percy) originally intended to have left the manuscript to Ritson; but the reiterated abuse with which that irritable and not always faultless antiquary visited him obliged him to alter his determination. With regard to the alterations (? amendments) made by Percy in the text, Mr. Douce told me that he (Percy) read to him one day from the MS., while he held the work in his hand to compare the two; and 'certainly the variations were greater than I could have expected,' said my old friend, with a shrug of the shoulders."

Of the other sources from which Percy drew his materials little need be said. 2. Some of the ballads were taken from MSS. in public libraries, and others from MSS. that were lent to him. 3. The Scotch ballads supplied by Sir David Dalrymple have already been referred to. 4. The printed ballads are chiefly taken from the Pepys Collection at Cambridge. 5. When the _Reliques_ were first published, the elegant poems in the _Paradyse of Daynty Devises, England's Helicon_, were little known, and it was a happy thought on the part of Percy to intersperse these smaller pieces among the longer ballads, so as to please the reader with a constant variety.

The weak point in the book is the insertion of some of the modern pieces. The old minstrel believed the wonders he related; but a poet educated in modern ideas cannot transfer himself back to the times of chivalry, so that his attempts at imitating "the true Gothic manner" are apt to fill his readers with a sense of unreality.

After the first edition of the _Reliques_ was printed, and before it was published, Percy made a great alteration in its arrangement. The first volume was turned into the third, and the third into the first, as may be seen by a reference to the foot of the pages where the old numbering remains. By this means the _Arthur Ballads_ were turned off to the end, and _Chevy Chase_ and _Robin Hood_ obtained the place of honour. Several ballads were also omitted at the last moment, and the numbers left vacant. These occur in a copy of two volumes at Oxford which formerly belonged to Douce. In Vol. III. (the old Vol. I.),