Chapter XXX: Part 30

The wounded man, already feeling the approach of death, #F#, #G#, #L#, asks that his bed may be made; he shall die before the morrow, #D#, #F#, #J#; let not his wife know, #F#, #G#. The wife asks why the men-servants, coachmen, are weeping, and is told that they have drowned [lost] some of the horses, #C-J#, #M# [have burned the king's carriage, #K#]. We will get others when the king comes, she answers, #C#, #D#, #H# [when I get up, #F#, as in Breton #A#]. Why are the maids weeping? The maids have lost sheets or towels in washing, #F#, #I#, #K#; have scorched the shirts in ironing, #C#, #D#, #H#. When the king comes, he will buy or bring better, #C#, #D#, #H# [when I get up, #F#, as in Breton #A#]. Why are the priests chanting? For a great feast to-morrow, #F#. Why are the carpenters at work? They are making a cradle for your boy, #C-E#, #H-K#. Why do the bells ring? A great lord is dead; in honor of somebody or something; #C#, #E-L#. Why does not Anzolin come to see me? He has gone a-hunting, #G#, #L#. What dress shall I put on to go to church? [When I get up I shall put on red, #F#, #I#.] You in black and I in gray, as in our country is the way, #C-F#, #H#, #I# [#H# moda a _Paris_, by corruption of dël pais]; I white, you gray, #J#; you will look well in black, #M#; put on red, or put on white, or put on black for custom's sake, #G#.

The children in the street say, That is the wife of the lord who was buried, or the people look at the lady in a marked way, #C#, #J#, #G#, #M#; and why is this? For the last time the mother-in-law puts off the question. At the church, under the family bench, there is a grave new made, and now it has to be said that the husband is buried there, #C-K#, #M#.

A conclusion is wanting in half of the ballads, and what there is is corrupted in others. The widow commends her boy to her husband's mother, #G#, #M#, and says she will die with her dear one, #D#, #E#, #J#, #M#. In #C#, as in French #V#, she wishes to speak to her husband. If the dead ever spake to the quick, she would speak once to her dear Lüis; if the quick ever spake to the dead, she would speak once to her dear husband. In #G# she bids the grave unlock, that she may come into the arms of her beloved, and then bids it close, that in his arms she may stay: cf. French #Y#, #Q#, #X#, #R#, #AA#.

The story of the Italian ballad, under the title of 'Il Conte Angiolino,' was given in epitome by Luigi Carrer, in his Prose e Poesie, Venice, 1838, IV, 81 f, before any copy had been published (omitted in later editions). According to Carrer's version, the lady, hearing bells, and seeing from her windows the church lighted up as for some office, extracts the fact from her mother-in-law on the spot, and then, going to the church and seeing her husband's tomb, prays that it would open and receive her.

A fragment of an Italian ballad given by Nigra, Romania, XI, 396, No 8, describes three card players, quarrelling over their game, as passing from words to knives, and from knives to pistols, and one of the party, the king of Spain, as being wounded in the fray. He rides home with a depressed air, and asks his mother to make his bed, for he shall be dead at midnight and his horse at dawn. There is a confusion of two stories here, as will be seen from Spanish ballads which are to be spoken of. Both stories are mixed with the original adventure of the mermaid in 'Il Cavaliere della bella spada,' already referred to as #B#. In this last the knight has a hundred and fifty stabs, and his horse ninety.[363]

Nigra has added to the valuable and beautiful ballads furnished to Romania, XI, a tale (p. 398) from the province of Turin, which preserves the earlier portion of the Breton story. A hunter comes upon a beautiful woman under a rock. She requires him to marry her, and is told by the hunter that he is already married. The beautiful woman, who is of course a fairy, presents the hunter with a box for his wife, which he is not to open. This box contains an explosive girdle, intended to be her death; and the hunter's curiosity impelling him to examine the gift, he is so much injured by a detonation which follows that he can just drag himself home to die.

#Spanish.# This ballad is very common in Catalonia, and has been found in Asturias. Since it is also known in Portugal, we may presume that it might be recovered in other parts of the peninsula. #A.# 'La bona viuda,' Briz, Cansons de la Terra, III, 155, 32 verses. #B.# 'La Viuda,' 33 verses, Milá y Fontanals, Romancerillo Catalan, 2d ed., p. 155, No 204. #C-I#. _Ib._ p. 156 f. #J.# _Ib._ p. 157 f, No 204, 36 verses. #K.# 'Romance de Doña Ana,' Asturias, the argument only, Amador de los Rios, Historia Critica de la Literatura Española, VII, 446, being No 30 of that author's unpublished collection.

The name of the husband is Don Joan de Sevilla, #D#, Don Joan, #F#, Don Olalbo, #I#, Don Francisco, #J#, Don Pedro, #K#. His wife, a princess, #A#, #G#, has given birth to a child, or is on the eve of so doing. The gentleman is away from home, or is about to leave home on a pilgrimage of a year and a day, #A#, #G#; has gone to war, #D#; to a hunt, #I#, #K#. He dies just as he returns home or is leaving home, or away from home, in other versions, but in #K# comes back in a dying condition, and begs that his state may be concealed from his wife. The lady, hearing a commotion in the house, and asking the cause, is told that it is the noisy mirth of the servants, #A-D#. There is music, chanting, tolling of bells; and this is said to be for a great person who has died, #B#, #D#, #A#. In #B#, #D#, the wife asks, Can it be for my husband? In #J# the mother-in-law explains her own sorrowful demeanor as occasioned by the death of an uncle, and we are informed that the burial was without bells, in order that the new mother might not hear. In #J# only do we have the question, Where is my husband? He has been summoned to court, says the mother-in-law, where, as a favorite, he will stay a year and ten days. When should the young mother go to mass? Peasants go after a fortnight, tradesfolk after forty days, etc.; she, as a great lady, will wait a year and a day, #A#, #D#, #I#, a year, #B#, a year and ten days, #J#. What dress should she wear, silk, gold tissue, silver? etc. Black would become her best, #A#, #J#, #K#. [Doña Ana, in #K#, like the lady in Italian #G#, resists the suggestion of mourning, as proper only for a widow, and appears in a costume de Pascua florida: in some other copies also she seems to wear a gay dress.] The people, the children, point to her, and say, There is the widow, and her mother-in-law parries the inquiry why she is the object of remark; but the truth is avowed when they see a grave digging, and the wife asks for whom it is, #A#. In #J# the lady sees a monument in the church, hung with black, reads her husband's name, and swoons. #B#, #C# make the mother's explanation follow upon the children's talk. In #K# the announcement is made first by a shepherd, then confirmed by gaping spectators and by a rejected lover. The widow commends her child to its grandmother, and says she will go to her husband in heaven, #A-D#; dies on the spot, #K#; Don Francisco dies in March, Doña Ana in May, #J#.

'Don Joan y Don Ramon' is a ballad in which a young man returns to his mother mortally wounded, and therefore would be likely to blend in the memory of reciters with any other ballad in which the same incident occurred. A version from the Balearic Islands may be put first, which has not yet taken up any characteristic part of the story of Renaud: Recuerdos y Bellezas de España, Mallorca, p. 336, 1842==Milá, 1853, p. 114, No 15, Briz, III, 172; Die Balearen in Wort und Bild geschildert, by the Archduke Ludwig Salvator, Leipzig, 1871, II, 556.[364]

Don Joan and Don Ramon are returning from the chase. Don Ramon falls from his horse; Don Joan rides off. Don Ramon's mother sees her son coming through a field, gathering plants to heal his wounds. "What is the matter?" she asks; "you are pale." "I have been bled, and they made a mistake." "Ill luck to the barber!" "Curse him not; it is the last time. Between me and my horse we have nine and twenty lance thrusts; the horse has nine and I the rest. The horse will die to-night and I in the morning. Bury him in the best place in the stable, and me in St Eulalia; lay a sword crosswise over my grave, and if it is asked who killed me, let the answer be, Don Joan de la cassada."

There are numerous Catalan versions, and most of them add something to this story: Milá, 2d ed., 'El guerrero mal herido,' p. 171, No 210, #A-F#, #A_{1}-G_{1}#, #A_{11}#; Briz, III, 171 f, two copies. These disagree considerably as to the cause of the hero's death, and the names are not constant. In #A_{1}# of Milá, as in the Balearic ballad, Don Joan and Don Ramon are coming from the chase, and have a passage at lances; Don Joan is left dead, and Don Ramon is little short of it. #A#, #B#, of Milá, tell us that Don Pedro died on the field of battle and Don Joan came home mortally wounded. #E# says that Don Joan and Don Ramon come from the chase, but Don Joan immediately says that he comes from a great battle. It is battle in #F_{1}#, in #E_{1}# (with Gastó returning), and in both the Catalan copies of Briz, the hero being Don Joan in the first of these last, and in the other nameless. The wounded man says he has been badly bled, Milá, #A#, #B#, #A_{1}#, #C_{1}#, Briz 2; he and his horse have lance wounds fifty-nine, thirty-nine, twenty-nine, etc., the horse nine and he the rest, Milá, #A#, #B#, #E#, #A_{1}#, Briz 1. His mother informs him that his wife has borne a child, "a boy like the morning star," Briz 1, and says that if he will go to the best chamber he will find her surrounded by dames and ladies. This gives him no pleasure; he does not care for wife, nor dames, nor ladies, nor boys, nor morning stars: Briz 1, Milá, #A_{1}-G_{1}#. He asks to have his bed made, Milá, #A-D#, #B_{1}#, #C_{1}#, Briz 1, 2, for he shall die at midnight and his horse at dawn, #A-D#, #A_{1}#, Briz 2, and gives directions for his burial and that of his horse. Let the bells toll when he is dead, and when people ask for whom it is, the answer will be, For Don Joan, Briz 1, Gastó, Milá, #E_{1}#, who was killed in battle. Let his arms be put over the place where his horse is buried, and when people ask whose arms they are his mother will say, My son's, who died in battle, Milá #A#, #B_{1}#. Let a drawn sword be laid across his grave, and let those that ask who killed him be told, Don Joan, at the chase, Milá, #A_{1}#.[365]

We have, probably, to do with two different ballads here, versions #A-F# of Milá's 'Guerrero mal herido,' and Briz's second, belonging with 'Don Joan y Don Ramon,' while #A_{1}-G_{1}# of Milá, and Briz's first, represent a ballad of the Renaud class. It is, however, possible that the first series may be imperfect copies of the second.

'Don Joan y Don Ramon' has agreements with Italian #B#, #A#: in #B#, particularly, we note the hundred and fifty stabs of the knight and the ninety of his horse.

#Portuguese.# A good Portuguese version, 'D. Pedro e D. Leonarda,' in fifty short verses, unfortunately lacking the conclusion, has been lately communicated to Romania (XI, 585) by Leite de Vasconcellos. Dom Pedro went hunting, to be gone a year and a day, but was compelled to return home owing to a malady which seized him. His mother greets him with the information that his wife has given birth to a son. "Comfort and cheer her," he says, "and for me make a bed, which I shall never rise from." The wife asks, Where is my husband, that he does not come to see me? "He has gone a-hunting for a year and a day," replies the mother. What is this commotion in the house? "Only visitors." But the bells are tolling! Could it be for my husband? "No, no; it is for a feast-day." When do women go to mass after child-birth? "Some in three weeks and some in two, but a lady of your rank after a year and a day." And what color do they wear? "Some light blue and some a thousand wonders, but you, as a lady of rank, will go in mourning." The ballad stops abruptly with a half-pettish, half-humorous imprecation from the daughter-in-law against the mother for keeping her shut up so long.

There is a Slavic ballad, which, like the versions that are so popular with the Romance nations, abridges the first part of the story, and makes the interest turn upon the gradual discovery of the hero's death, but in other respects agrees with northern tradition.

#Bohemian.# #A a.# Erben, p. 473, No 9, Heřman a Dornička==Waldau, Böhmische Granaten, I, 73, No 100; #b.# Čelakowsky, I, 26==Haupt u. Schmaler, I, 327. #B.# Erben, p. 475. #C.# Moravian, Sušil, p. 82, No 89 a, 'Nešt'astná svatba,' 'The Doleful Wedding.' #D.# Sušil, p. 83, No 89 b. #E.# Slovak, Čelakowsky, I, 80.

#Wendish.# #A.# Haupt und Schmaler, I, 31, No 3, 'Zrudny kwas,' 'The Doleful Wedding.' #B.# II, 131, No 182, 'Plakajuen ńeẃesta,' 'The Weeping Bride' (the last eight stanzas, the ten before being in no connection).

The hero on his wedding day is making ready his horse to fetch the bride; for he is, as in the Scandinavian ballads, not yet a married man. His mother, Bohemian #A#, ascertaining his intention, begs him not to go himself with the bridal escort. Obviously she has a premonition of misfortune. Herman will never invite guests, and not go for them. The mother, in an access of passion, exclaims, If you go, may you break your neck, and never come back! Here we are reminded of the Färöe ballad. Bohemian #C#, #D# make the forebodings to rise in Herman's mind, not in his mother's. The mother opposes the match in Bohemian #E#, and the sister wishes that he may break his neck. Wendish #A# has nothing of opposition or bodement before the start, but the crows go winging about the young men who are going for the bride, and caw a horrible song, how the bridegroom shall fall from his horse and break his neck. The train sets off with a band of trumpets, drums, and stringed instruments, or, Bohemian #D#, with a discharge of a hundred muskets, and when they come to a linden in a meadow Herman's horse "breaks his foot," and the rider his neck; Bohemian #D#, when they come to a copse in a meadow the hundred pieces are again discharged, and Herman is mortally wounded. His friends stand debating what they shall do. The dying man bids them keep on: since the bride cannot be his, she shall be his youngest brother's, Bohemian #A#, #C#; cf. Danish #L#, #O#, #R#, Norwegian #C#, #F#. The train arrives at the bride's house; the bride comes out to greet them, but, not seeing the bridegroom, inquires affrightedly what has become of him. They pretend that he has remained at home to see to the tables. The mother is reluctant to give them the bride, but finally yields. When the train comes again to the linden in the mead, Dorothy sees blood. It is Herman's! she cries; but they assure her that it is the blood of a deer that Herman had killed for the feast. They reach Herman's house, where the bride has an appalling reception, which need not be particularized.

In Bohemian #A#, while they are at supper (or at half-eve==three in the afternoon), a death-bell is heard. Dorothy turns pale. For whom are they tolling? Surely it is for Herman. They tell her that Herman is lying in his room with a bad headache, and that the bell is ringing for a child. But she guesses the truth, sinks down and dies, #a#. She wears two knives in her hair, and thrusts one of them into her heart, #b#. The two are buried in one grave. In Bohemian #B# the bell sounds for the first time as the first course is brought on, and a second time when the second course comes. The bride is told in each case that the knell is for a child. Upon the third sounding, when the third course is brought in, they tell her that it is for Herman. She seizes two knives and runs to the graveyard: with one she digs herself a grave, and with the other stabs herself. In the Wendish fragment #B#, at the first and second course (there is no bell) the bride asks where the bridegroom is, and at the third repeats the question with tears. She is told that he is ranging the woods, killing game for his wedding. In Bohemian #C# the bell tolls while they are getting the table ready. The bride asks if it is for Herman, and is told that it is for a child. When they sit down to table, the bells toll again. For whom should this be? For whom but Herman? She springs out of the window, and the catastrophe is the same as in Bohemian #B#. In #D# the bride hears the bell as the train is approaching the house, and they say it is for a child. On entering the court she asks where Herman is. He is in the cellar drawing wine for his guests. She asks again for Herman as the company sits down to table, and the answer is, In the chamber, lying in a coffin. She springs from the table and rushes to the chamber, seizing two golden knives, one of which she plunges into her heart. In Bohemian #E#, when the bride arrives at John the bridegroom's house, and asks where he is, they tell her she had better go to bed till midnight. The moment she touches John she springs out of bed, and cries, Dear people, why have ye laid a living woman with a dead man? They stand, saying, What shall we give her, a white cap or a green chaplet? "I have not deserved the white (widow's) cap," she says; "I have deserved a green chaplet." In Wendish #A#, when the bell first knolls, the bride asks, Where is the bridegroom? and they answer, In the new chamber, putting on his fine clothes. A second toll evokes a second inquiry; and they say he is in the new room, putting on his sword. The third time they conceal nothing: He fell off his horse and broke his neck. "Then tear off my fine clothes and dress me in white, that I may mourn a year and a day, and go to church in a green chaplet, and never forget him that loved me!" It will be remembered that the bride takes her own life in Norwegian #A#, #C#, #D#, and in Swedish #E#, as she does in Bohemian #A b#, #B#, #C#, #D#.

* * * * *

#B# is translated by Grundtvig, Engelske og skotske Folkeviser, p. 305, No 48; by Doenniges, p. 25.

'Der Ritter von Staufenberg' is translated by Jamieson, from the "Romanzen" in the Wunderhorn, in Illustrations of Northern Antiquities, p. 257. Danish #A# by Prior, II, 301; #B# by Jamieson, Popular Ballads, I, 219, and by Prior, II, 306, Buchanan, p. 52. 'The Erl-King's Daughter,' "Danish," in Lewis's Tales of Wonder, I, 53, No 10, is rendered from Herder. Swedish #A# by Keightley, Fairy Mythology, p. 84; #B# by Keightley, p. 82, and by William and Mary Howitt, Literature and Romance of Northern Europe, I, 269. There is a version from Swedish by J. H. Dixon, in Notes and Queries, 4th Series, I, 168. Breton #D# by Keightley, as above, p. 433, and by Tom Taylor, Ballads and Songs of Brittany, 'Lord Nann and the Fairy,' p. 9. Bohemian #A b# by Bowring, Cheskian Anthology, p. 69.

#A#

From a transcript from William Tytler's Brown MS.

1
Clark Colven and his gay ladie,
As they walked to yon garden green,
A belt about her middle gimp,
Which cost Clark Colven crowns fifteen:

2
'O hearken weel now, my good lord,
O hearken weel to what I say;
When ye gang to the wall o Stream,
O gang nae neer the well-fared may.'

3
'O haud your tongue, my gay ladie,
Tak nae sic care o me;
For I nae saw a fair woman
I like so well as thee.'

4
He mounted on his berry-brown steed,
And merry, merry rade he on,
Till he came to the wall o Stream,
And there he saw the mermaiden.

5
'Ye wash, ye wash, ye bonny may,
And ay's ye wash your sark o silk:'
'It's a' for you, ye gentle knight,
My skin is whiter than the milk.'

6
He's taen her by the milk-white hand,
He's taen her by the sleeve sae green,
And he's forgotten his gay ladie,
And away with the fair maiden.

* * * * * * *

7
'Ohon, alas!' says Clark Colven,
'And aye sae sair's I mean my head!'
And merrily leugh the mermaiden,
'O win on till you be dead.

8
'But out ye tak your little pen-knife,
And frae my sark ye shear a gare;
Row that about your lovely head,
And the pain ye'll never feel nae mair.'

9
Out he has taen his little pen-knife,
And frae her sark he's shorn a gare,
Rowed that about his lovely head,
But the pain increased mair and mair.

10
'Ohon, alas!' says Clark Colven,
'An aye sae sair's I mean my head!'
And merrily laughd the mermaiden,
'It will ay be war till ye be dead.'

11
Then out he drew his trusty blade,
And thought wi it to be her dead,
But she's become a fish again,
And merrily sprang into the fleed.

12
He's mounted on his berry-brown steed,
And dowy, dowy rade he home,
And heavily, heavily lighted down
When to his ladie's bower-door he came.

13
'Oh, mither, mither, mak my bed,
And, gentle ladie, lay me down;
Oh, brither, brither, unbend my bow,
'T will never be bent by me again.'

14
His mither she has made his bed,
His gentle ladie laid him down,
His brither he has unbent his bow,
'T was never bent by him again.

B

Herd's Ancient and Modern Scots Songs, 1769, p. 302; ed.
1776, I, 161.

1
Clerk Colvill and his lusty dame
Were walking in the garden green;
The belt around her stately waist
Cost Clerk Colvill of pounds fifteen.

2
'O promise me now, Clerk Colvill,
Or it will cost ye muckle strife,
Ride never by the wells of Slane,
If ye wad live and brook your life.'

3
'Now speak nae mair, my lusty dame,
Now speak nae mair of that to me;
Did I neer see a fair woman,
But I wad sin with her body?'

4
He's taen leave o his gay lady,
Nought minding what his lady said,
And he's rode by the wells of Slane,
Where washing was a bonny maid.

5
'Wash on, wash on, my bonny maid,
That wash sae clean your sark of silk;'
'And weel fa you, fair gentleman,
Your body whiter than the milk.'

* * * * * * *

6
Then loud, loud cry'd the Clerk Colvill,
'O my head it pains me sair;'
'Then take, then take,' the maiden said,
'And frae my sark you'll cut a gare.'

7
Then she's gied him a little bane-knife,
And frae her sark he cut a share;
She's ty'd it round his whey-white face,
But ay his head it aked mair.

8
Then louder cry'd the Clerk Colvill,
'O sairer, sairer akes my head;'
'And sairer, sairer ever will,'
The maiden crys, 'till you be dead.'

9
Out then he drew his shining blade,
Thinking to stick her where she stood,
But she was vanishd to a fish,
And swam far off, a fair mermaid.

10
'O mother, mother, braid my hair;
My lusty lady, make my bed;
O brother, take my sword and spear,
For I have seen the false mermaid.'

C

Notes and Queries, 4th Series, VIII, 510, from the
recitation of a lady in Forfarshire.

1
Clerk Colin and his mother dear
Were in the garden green;
The band that was about her neck
Cost Colin pounds fifteen;
The belt about her middle sae sma
Cost twice as much again.

2
'Forbidden gin ye wad be, love Colin,
Forbidden gin ye wad be,
And gang nae mair to Clyde's water,
To court yon gay ladie.'

3
'Forbid me frae your ha, mother,
Forbid me frae your bour,
But forbid me not frae yon ladie;
She's fair as ony flour.

4
'Forbidden I winna be, mother,
Forbidden I winna be,
For I maun gang to Clyde's water,
To court yon gay ladie.'

5
An he is on his saddle set,
As fast as he could win,
An he is on to Clyde's water,
By the lee licht o the moon.

6
An when he cam to the Clyde's water
He lichted lowly down,
An there he saw the mermaiden,
Washin silk upon a stane.

7
'Come down, come down, now, Clerk Colin,
Come down an [fish] wi me;
I'll row ye in my arms twa,
An a foot I sanna jee.'

* * * * * * *

8
'O mother, mother, mak my bed,
And, sister, lay me doun,
An brother, tak my bow an shoot,
For my shooting is done.'

9
He wasna weel laid in his bed,
Nor yet weel fa'en asleep,
When up an started the mermaiden,
Just at Clerk Colin's feet.

10
'Will ye lie there an die, Clerk Colin,
Will ye lie there an die?
Or will ye gang to Clyde's water,
To fish in flood wi me?'

11
'I will lie here an die,' he said,
'I will lie here an die;
In spite o a' the deils in hell
I will lie here an die.'

* * * * *

#A.#

7^3. _~laugh~; but we have ~laughd~ in 10^3._

9^3. _~Rowed~ seems to be written ~Round~, possibly
~Rowad~._

14^3. brother.

#B.#

5^4. _The edition of 1776 has ~body's~._

#C.#

7. When they part he returns home, and on the way his head
becomes "wondrous sair:" _seemingly a comment of the
reciter_.

_The Abbotsford copy in "~Scottish Songs~," fol. 3, has
these readings, not found in Lewis, the Brown MS., or
Herd._

3^2.

And dinna deave me wi your din: _Lewis_,
And haud, my Lady gay, your din.

6^3. He's laid her on the flowery green.

[345] "From a MS. in my grandfather's writing, with the following note: Copied from an old MS. in the possession of Alexander Fraser Tytler." Note of Miss Mary Fraser Tytler. The first stanza agrees with that which is cited from the original by Dr Anderson in Nichols's Illustrations, VII, 177, and the number of stanzas is the same.

Colvill, which has become familiar from Herd's copy, is the correct form, and Colven, Colvin, a vulgarized one, which in #C# lapses into Colin.

[346] Still, though these _particular verses_ appear to have come from 'The Drowned Lovers,' they may represent other original ones which were to the same effect. See, further on, the beginning of some Färöe versions.

[347] Hoc equidem a viris omni exceptione majoribus quotidie scimus probatum, quod quosdam hujusmodi larvarum quas fadas nominant amatores audivimus, et cum ad aliarum foeminarum matrimonia se transtulerunt, ante mortuos quam cum superinductis carnali se copula immiscuerunt. Des Gervasius von Tilbury Otia Imperialia (of about 1211), Liebrecht, p. 41.

[348] Der Ritter von Stauffenberg, from a MS. of perhaps 1437, C. M. Engelhardt, Strassburg, 1823. Edited by Oskar Jänicke, in Altdeutsche Studien von O. Jänicke, E. Steinmeyer, W. Wilmanns, Berlin, 1871. Die Legende vom Ritter Herrn Peter Diemringer von Staufenberg in der Ortenau, reprint by F. Culemann of the Strassburg edition of Martin Schott, 1480-82. The old printed copy was made over by Fischart in 1588 (Jobin, Strassburg, in that year), and this 'ernewerte Beschreibung der alten Geschicht' is rehashed in seven 'Romanzen' in Wunderhorn, I, 407-18, ed. 1806, 401-12, ed. 1853. Simrock, Die deutschen Volksbücher, III, 1-48.

[349] Engelhardt, pp 6, 13 f: Sagen aus Baden und der Umgegend, Carlsruhe, 1834, pp 107-122.

[350] Separately printed, under the title, Elveskud, dansk, svensk, norsk, færøsk, islandsk, skotsk, vendisk, bømisk, tysk, fransk, italiensk, katalonsk, spansk, bretonsk Folkevise, i overblik ved Svend Grundtvig. Kjøbenhavn, 1881.

[351] All the Norse versions are in two-line stanzas.

[352] In 'Jomfruen og Dværgekongen,' #C# 25, 26, Grundtvig, No 37, the woman who has been carried off to the hill, wishing to die, asks that atter-corns may be put into her drink. She evidently gets, however, only the villar-konn, elvar-konn, of Landstad, Nos 42-45, which are of lethean property. But in J. og D. #F#, we may infer an atter-corn, though none is mentioned, from the effect of the draughts, which is that belt, stays, and sark successively burst. See p. 363 f.

[353] So, also, Swedish #A#, #F#, Norwegian #A#, #C#. This is a cantrip sleight of the elves. The Icelandic burden supposes this illumination, "The low was burning red;" and when Olaf seeks to escape, in Norwegian #A#, #C#, #E#, #G#, #I#, #K#, he has to make his way through the elf-flame, elvelogi.

[354] Grundtvig remarks that Herder's translation, 'Erlkönigs Tochter,' Volkslieder, II, 158, took so well with the Germans that at last it came to pass for an original German ballad. The Wunderhorn, I, 261, ed. 1806, gives it with the title, 'Herr Olof,' as from a flying sheet (==Scherer's Deutsche Volkslieder, 1851, p. 371). It appears, with some little changes, in Zarnack's Deutsche Volkslieder, 1819, I, 29, whence it passed into Erlach, IV, 6, and Richter und Marschner, p. 60. Kretzschmer has the translation, again, with a variation here and there, set to a "North German" and to a "Westphalian" air, p. 8, p. 9.

[355] Owing to a close resemblance of circumstances in 'The Elf-shot,' in 'Frillens Hævn' ('The Leman's Wreak'), Grundtvig, No 208, and in 'Ribold og Guldborg,' Grundtvig, No 82, these ballads naturally have details in common. The pretence that the horse was not sure-footed and hurtled his rider against a tree; the request to mother, father, etc., to make the bed, take care of the horse, apply a bandage, send for a priest, etc.; the testament, the assignment of the bride by the dying man to his brother, and her declaration that she will never give her troth to two brothers; and the nearly simultaneous death of hero, bride, and mother, occur in many versions of both Elveskud and Ribold, and most of them in Frillens Hævn. A little Danish ballad, 'Hr. Olufs Død,' cited by Grundtvig, IV, 847, seems to be Elveskud with the elf-shot omitted.

[356] Luzel was in possession of other versions, but he assures us that every detail is contained in one or the other of these three.

[357] #B# 13, "You must marry me straightway, or give me my weight in silver;" _then_, "or die in three days," etc. It is not impossible that this stanza, entirely out of place in this ballad, was derived from 'Le Comte des Chapelles,' Luzel, p. 457, from which certain French versions have taken a part of their story. See Luzel, the eighth and ninth stanzas, on p. 461.

[358] #B# 50, "A white gown, or _broget_, or my violet petticoat?" Luzel says he does not understand _broget_, and in his Observations, prefixed to the volume, expresses a conjecture that it must have been altered from _droged_, robe d'enfant, robe de femme, but we evidently want a color. Grundtvig remarks that _broget_ would make sense in Danish, where it means party-colored. Scotch _broakit_ is black and white. Icelandic _brók_, tartan, party-colored cloth, is said to be from Gaelic _breac_, versicolor (Vigfusson). This points to a suitable meaning for Breton _broget_.

[359] #D# adds: "It was a marvel to see, the night after husband and wife had been buried, two oaks rise from the common tomb, and on their branches two white doves, which sang there at daybreak, and then took flight for the skies."

[360] It will be observed that some of the Renaud ballads in the Poésies populaires de la France were derived from earlier publications: such as were communicated by collectors appear to have been sent in in 1852 or 1853. The versions cited by Rathery, Revue Critique, II, 287 ff, are all from the MS. Poésies populaires. #BB#, #CC# have either been overlooked by me in turning over the first five volumes, or occur in vol. vi, which has not yet been received. #GG# came to hand too late to be ranked at its proper place.

[361] In #C# the mother-in-law tells her daughter, austerely:

Vous aurez plutôt trouvé un mari
Que moi je n'aurai trouvé un fils.

So #E#, nearly. A mother makes a like remark to the betrothed of a dead son in the Danish ballad of 'Ebbe Tygesen,' Grundtvig, Danske Kæmpeviser og Folkesange, fornyede i gammel Stil, 1867, p. 122, st. 14. #F# and #T# conclude with these words of the wife:

'Ma mère, dites au fossoyeur
Qu'il creuse une fosse pour deux;
'Et que l'espace y soit si grand
Que l'on y mette aussi l'enfant.'

The burial of father, mother, and child in a common grave is found elsewhere in ballads, as in 'Redselille og Medelvold,' Grundtvig, No 271, #A# 37, #G# 20, #M# 26, #X# 27.

[362] Shutting our eyes to other Romance versions, or, we may say, opening them to Scandinavian ones, we might see in these stabs the wounds made by the elf-knives in Danish #D#, #G#, #H#, #N#, #O#, #R#, #X#, Swedish #G#, Norwegian #H#, #I#. See 'Don Joan y Don Ramon,' further on.

[363] The ballad of 'Luggieri,' published by Salvatori in the Rassegna Settimanale, Rome, June 22, 1879, and reprinted by Nigra in Romania, XI, 391 (a variety of 'Rizzardo bello,' Wolf, Volkslieder aus Venetien, p. 62, No 83), appears to me not to belong with 'Renaud,' but with the class of 'The Cruel Brother,' as already remarked of the Venetian ballad at p. 142.

[364] The version in the Recuerdos was obtained in Majorca by Don J. M. Quadrado. The editor remarks that the employment of the articles Il and La instead of Es and Sa proves it to be as old as the sixteenth century. Die Balearen, etc., is cited after Grundtvig.

[365] I do not entirely understand Professor Milá's arrangement of those texts which he has not printed in full, and it is very likely that more of his copies than I have cited exhibit some of the traits specified.

43

THE BROOMFIELD HILL

#A.# 'The Broomfield Hill.' #a.# Scott's Minstrelsy, III,
271, 1803. #b.# The same, II, 229, 1802.

#B.# 'I'll wager, I'll wager,' etc., Herd's Ancient and
Modern Scots Songs, 1769, p. 310.

#C.# 'Broomfield Hills,' Buchan's Ballads of the North of
Scotland, II, 291.

#D.# 'Lord John,' Kinloch's Ancient Scottish Ballads, p.
195.

#E.# Joseph Robertson's Note-Book, January, 1830, p. 7.

#F.# 'The Merry Broomfield, or The West Country Wager.'
#a.# Douce Ballads, III, fol. 64^b. #b.# The same, IV,
fol. 10.

A song of 'Brume, brume on hil' is one of those named in The Complaint of Scotland, 1549, p. 64 of Dr J. A. H. Murray's edition. "The foot of the song" is sung, with others, by Moros in Wager's "very merry and pithy Comedy called The longer thou livest the more fool thou art," c. 1568. 'Broom, broom on hil' is also one of Captain Cox's "bunch of ballets and songs, all auncient," No 53 of the collection, 1575.[366] The lines that Moros sings are:

Brome, brome on hill,
The gentle brome on hill, hill,
Brome, brome on Hive hill,
The gentle brome on Hive hill,
The brome stands on Hive hill #a#.

"A more sanguine antiquary than the editor," says Scott, "might perhaps endeavor to identify this poem, which is of undoubted antiquity, with the 'Broom, broom on hill' mentioned ... as forming part of Captain Cox's collection." Assuredly "Broom, broom on hill," if that were all, would justify no such identification, but the occurrence of Hive hill, both in the burden which Moros sings and in the eighth stanza of Scott's ballad, is a circumstance that would embolden even a very cautious antiquary, if he had received Hive hill from tradition, and was therefore unaffected by a suspicion that this locality had been introduced by an editor from the old song.[367]

Most of the versions give no explicit account of the knight's prolonged sleep. He must needs be asleep when the lady comes to him, else there would be no story; but his heavy slumber, not broken by all the efforts of his horse and his hawk, is as a matter of course not natural; es geht nicht zu mit rechten dingen; the witch-wife of #A# 4 is at the bottom of that. And yet the broom-flowers strewed on his hals-bane in #A# 8, #B# 3, and the roses in #D# 6, are only to be a sign that the maid had been there and was gone. Considering the character of many of Buchan's versions, we cannot feel sure that #C# has not borrowed the second and third stanzas from #B#, and the witch-wife, in the sixth, from #A#; but it would be extravagant to call in question the genuineness of #C# as a whole. The eighth stanza gives us the light which we require.

'Ye'll pu the bloom frae aff the broom,
Strew't at his head and feet,
And aye the thicker that ye do strew,
The sounder he will sleep.'

The silver belt about the knight's head in #A# 5 can hardly have to do with his sleeping, and to me seems meaningless. It is possible that roses are not used at random in #D# 6, though, like the posie of pleasant perfume in #F# 9, they serve only to prove that the lady had been there. An excrescence on the dog-rose, rosenschwamm, schlafkunz, kunz, schlafapfel, it is believed in Germany, if laid under a man's pillow, will make him sleep till it is taken away. Grimm, Deutsche Mythologie, p. 1008, and Deutsches Wörterbuch (Hildebrand), V, 2753 _e_.

#C# makes the lady hide in the broom to hear what the knight will say when he wakes, and in this point agrees with the broadside #F#, as also in the comment made by the men on their master in stanza 24; cf. #F# 16.

Mr J. W. Dixon has reprinted an Aldermary Churchyard copy of the broadside, differing as to four or five words only from #F#, in Ancient Poems, Ballads, and Songs of the Peasantry of England, p. 116, Percy Society, Volume XVII. The editor remarks that #A# is evidently taken from #F#; from which it is clear that the pungent buckishness of the broadside does not necessarily make an impression. #A# smells of the broom; #F# suggests the groom.[368]

The sleep which is produced in #A# by strewing the flower of the broom on a man's head and feet, according to a witch's advice, is brought about in two Norse ballads by means not simply occult, but altogether preternatural; that is, by the power of runes. One of these, 'Sömn-runorna,' Arwidsson, II, 249, No 133, is preserved in a manuscript of the end of the seventeenth, or the beginning of the eighteenth, century. The other, 'Sövnerunerne,' Grundtvig, II, 337, No 81, was taken down in 1847 from the singing of a woman seventy-five years of age.

The Swedish ballad runs thus. There is a damsel in our land who every night will sleep with a man, and dance a maid in the morning. The fame of this comes to the ears of the son of the king of England, who orders his horse, thinking to catch this damsel. When he arrives at the castle gate, there stands the lady, and asks him what is his haste. He frankly answers that he expects to get a fair maid's honor for his pains, and she bids him follow her to the upper room. She lays sheets on the bed, and writes strong runes on them. The youth sits down on the bed, and is asleep before he can stretch himself out. He sleeps through that day, and the next, and into the third. Then the lady rouses him. "Wake up; you are sleeping your two eyes out." He is still so heavy that he can hardly stir. He offers her his horse and saddle to report the matter as he wishes. "Keep your horse," she says; "shame fa such liars."

The Danish story is much the same. One of a king's five sons goes to make trial of the maid. She tells him to fasten his horse while she goes before and unlocks; calls to her maid to bring five feather-beds, feather-beds nine, and write a sleep on each of them. He sleeps through three days, and is roused the fourth, with "Wake up, wake up; you have slept away your pluck." He offers her a bribe, as before, which she scornfully rejects, assuring him that he will not be spared when she comes among maids and knights.

A sleep produced by runes or gramarye is one of the two main incidents of a tale in the Gesta Romanorum, better known through the other, which is the forfeit of flesh for money not forthcoming at the day set, as in the Merchant of Venice: Latin, Oesterley, No 195, p. 603;[369] English, Harleian MS. 7333, No 40, printed by Douce, Illustrations of Shakspere, I, 281, Madden, p. 130, Herrtage, p. 158; German, No 68, of the printed edition of 1489 (which I have not seen). A knight, who has a passion for an emperor's daughter, engages to give a thousand [hundred] marks for being once admitted to her bed. He instantly falls asleep, and has to be roused in the morning. Like terms are made for a second night, and the man's lands have to be pledged to raise the money. He sleeps as before, but stipulates for a third night at the same price. A merchant lends him the thousand marks, on condition that, if he breaks his day, his creditor may take the money's weight of flesh from his body. Feeling what a risk he is now running, the knight consults a philosopher, Virgil, in the English version. The philosopher (who in the Latin version says he ought to know, for he had helped the lady to her trick) tells the knight that between the sheet and coverlet of the bed there is a letter, which causes the sleep; this he must find, and, when found, cast far from the bed. The knight follows these directions, and gets the better of the lady, who conceives a reciprocal passion for him, and delivers him, in the sequel, from the fearful penalty of his bond by pleading that the flesh must be taken without shedding of blood.

The romance of Dolopathos, a variety of the Seven Wise Masters, written about 1185, considerably before the earliest date which has hitherto been proposed for the compilation of the Gesta, has this story, with variations, of which only these require to be noted. The lady has herself been a student in magic. She is wooed of many; all comers are received, and pay a hundred marks; any one who accomplishes his will may wed her the next day. An enchanted feather of a screech-owl, laid under the pillow, makes all who enter the bed fall asleep at once, and many have been baffled by this charm. At last a youth of high birth, but small means, tries his fortune, and, failing at the first essay, tries once more. Thinking that the softness of his couch was the cause of his falling asleep, he puts away the pillow, and in this process the feather is thrown out: Iohannis de Alta Silva Dolopathos, ed. Oesterley, pp 57-59; Herbers, Li Romans de Dolopathos, Brunet et Montaiglon, vv 7096-7498, pp 244-59; Le Roux de Lincy, in a sequel to Loiseleur-Deslongchamps's Essai sur les Fables indiennes, pp 211 ff. This form of the tale is found in German, in a fifteenth-century manuscript, from which it was printed by Haupt in Altdeutsche Blätter, I, 143-49; but here the sleep is produced by the use of _both_ the means employed in the Gesta and in Dolopathos, letter (runes) and feather, "the wild man's feather."[370]

Magic is dropped, and a sleeping draught administered, just as the man is going to bed, in a version of the story in the Pecorone of Ser Giovanni Fiorentino, Giornata, IV^a, Nov. 1_{a} (last quarter of the fourteenth century). Upon the third trial the man, warned by a friendly chambermaid not to drink, pours the medicated wine into his bosom. The account of Ser Giovanni is adopted in Les Adventures d'Abdalla fils d'Hanif, etc., La Haye, 1713, Bibliothèque de Romans, 1778, Janvier, I, 112-14, 143 f.

Ellin writes sleep-runes on the cushions on which her husband is to sleep, in the Danish ballad 'Frændehævn,' Grundtvig, No 4, #A# 33 [#C# 45].

In Icelandic tales a sleep-thorn[371] is employed, probably a thorn inscribed with runes. The thorn is stuck into the clothes or into the head (the ears, according to the popular notion, Vigfusson), and the sleep lasts till the thorn is taken out. Odin stuck such a thorn into Brynhild's garments: Fáfnismál, 43; Sigrdrífumál, 7; Völsúnga Saga, Fornaldar Sögur, I, 166. The thorn is put into the clothes also in the Icelandic fairy-tale, Mærþöll, Maurer, Isländische Volkssagen, p. 286. Ólöf, to save herself from Helgi's violence, and to punish his insolence, sticks him with a sleep-thorn after he is dead drunk: Hrólfs Saga Kraka, Forn. S. I, 18f, Torfæus, p. 32. Vilhjálmr sticks a sleep-thorn into Hrólfr, and he lies as if dead so long as the thorn is in him: Gaungu-Hrólfs Saga, Forn. S., III, 303, 306.

A pillow of soporific quality, which Kamele, by Isot's direction, puts under Kaedin's head, assures her safety though she lies all night by his side: Ulrich's continuation of Gottfried's Tristan, vv 1668-99, 1744-85; and Heinrich's continuation, omitting the last circumstance, vv 4861-4960 (J. Grimm).

The witch-woman, in the English ballad, #A# 4, represents the philosopher in the Gesta, and the wager in the other versions the fee or fine exacted by the lady in the Gesta and elsewhere.

An Italian ballad, a slight and unmeritable thing, follows the story of Ser Giovanni, or agrees with it, in respect to the sleeping-draught. A man falls in with a girl at a spring, and offers her a hundred ducats, or scudi, per una nottina. The girl says that she must consult her mother. The mother advises her to accept the offer: she will give the man a drug, and the money will serve for a dowry. The man, roused in the morning, counts out the money with one hand and wipes his eyes with the other. When asked why he is crying, he replies that the money is not the loss he weeps for, and makes a second offer of the same amount. The girl wishes to refer the matter to her mother again, but the gallant says the mother shall not take him in a second time. One version (#A#) ends somewhat more respectably: the girl declares that, having come off with her honor once, she will not again expose herself to shame. #A.# Ferraro, Canti popolari monferrini, 'La Ragazza onesta,' p. 66, No 47. #B.# Ferraro, C. p. di Ferrara, Cento e Pontelagoscuro, p. 53 (Cento) No 4, 'La Ragazza onesta.' #C.# The same, p. 94 (Pontelagoscuro) No 8, 'La Brunetta,' previously in Rivista di Filologia Romanza, II, 200. #D.# Wolf, Volkslieder aus Venetien, p. 74, 'La Contadina alla Fonte.' #E.# Bernoni, C. p. veneziani, Puntata V, No 4, p. 6, 'La bella Brunetta.' #F.# Bolza, Canzoni p. comasche, p. 677, No 57, 'L'Amante deluso.' #G.# Ive, C. p. istriani, p. 324, No 4, 'La Contadina alla Fonte.' #H.# Ginandrea, C. p. marchigiani, p. 277, No 12, 'La Madre indegna.' #I.# Ferraro, C. p. della Bassa Romagna, Rivista di Letteratura popolare, p. 57, 'La Ragazza onesta.' #J.# Casetti e Imbriani, C. p. della Provincie meridionali, p. 1, No 1 (Chieti), the first sixteen verses. #K.# Archivio per Tradizioni popolari, I, 89, No 4, 'La Fandéll e lu Cavalére,' the first thirteen lines.

'The Sleepy Merchant,' a modern ballad, in Kinloch's MSS, V, 26, was perhaps fashioned on some traditional report of the story in Il Pecorone. The girl gives the merchant a drink, and when the sun is up starts to her feet, crying, "I'm a leal maiden yet!" The merchant comes back, and gets another dram, but "tooms it a' between the bolster and the wa," and then sits up and sings.

A ballad found everywhere in Germany, but always in what appears to be an extremely defective form, must originally, one would think, have had some connection with those which we are considering. A hunter meets a girl on the heath, and takes her with him to his hut, where they pass the night. She rouses him in the morning, and proclaims herself still a maid. The hunter is so chagrined that he is of a mind to kill her, but spares her life. 'Der Jäger,' 'Der ernsthafte Jäger,' 'Des Jägers Verdruss,' 'Der Jäger und die reine Jungfrau,' 'Der verschlafene Jäger:' Meinert, p. 203; Wunderhorn, 1857, I, 274, Birlinger u. Crecelius, I, 190; Büsching u. von der Hagen, p. 134, No 51; Nicolai, Almanach, I, 77 (fragment); Erk u. Irmer, ii, 12, No 15; Meier, p. 305, No 170; Pröhle, No 54, p. 81; Fiedler, p. 175; Erk, Liederhort, pp 377 f, Nos 174, 174^a; Hoffmann u. Richter, p. 202, No 176; Ditfurth, Fränkische Volkslieder, II, 26 f, Nos 30, 31; Norrenberg, Des dülkener Fiedlers Liederbuch, No 16, p. 20; J. A. E. Köhler, Volksbrauch im Voigtlande, p. 307; Jeitteles, Volkslied in Steiermark, Archiv für Lit. gesch., IX, 361, etc.; Uhland, No 104, Niederdeutsches Liederbuch, No 59, 'vermuthlich vom Eingang des 17. Jhd.' Cf. Die Mâeget, Flemish, Büsching u. von der Hagen, p. 311; Willems, p. 160, No 61.[372]

#A a# is translated by Doenniges, p. 3; by Gerhard, p. 146; by Arndt, Blütenlese, p. 226.

A

#a.# Scott's Minstrelsy, III, 271, ed. 1803. #b.# Sts.
8-14; the same, II, 229, ed. 1802.

1
There was a knight and a lady bright,
Had a true tryste at the broom;
The ane gaed early in the morning,
The other in the afternoon.

2
And ay she sat in her mother's bower door,
And ay she made her mane:
'O whether should I gang to the Broomfield Hill,
Or should I stay at hame?

3
'For if I gang to the Broomfield Hill,
My maidenhead is gone;
And if I chance to stay at hame,
My love will ca me mansworn.'

4
Up then spake a witch-woman,
Ay from the room aboon:
'O ye may gang to the Broomfield Hill,
And yet come maiden hame.

5
'For when ye gang to the Broomfield Hill,
Ye'll find your love asleep,
With a silver belt about his head,
And a broom-cow at his feet.

6
'Take ye the blossom of the broom,
The blossom it smells sweet,
And strew it at your true-love's head,
And likewise at his feet.

7
'Take ye the rings off your fingers,
Put them on his right hand,
To let him know, when he doth awake,
His love was at his command.'

8
She pu'd the broom flower on Hive Hill,
And strewd on 's white hals-bane,
And that was to be wittering true
That maiden she had gane.

9
'O where were ye, my milk-white steed,
That I hae coft sae dear,
That wadna watch and waken me
When there was maiden here?'

10
'I stamped wi my foot, master,
And gard my bridle ring,
But na kin thing wald waken ye,
Till she was past and gane.'

11
'And wae betide ye, my gay goss-hawk,
That I did love sae dear,
That wadna watch and waken me
When there was maiden here.'

12
'I clapped wi my wings, master,
And aye my bells I rang,
And aye cry'd, Waken, waken, master,
Before the ladye gang.'