The eldest to the youngest said, "'Tis time we were away. The cock, he hadna crawed but once, When the youngest to the eldest said, "The cock doth craw, the day doth daw, Gin we be mist out o' our place, "Fare ye weel, my mother dear! And fare ye weel, the bonny lass That kindles my mother's fire.'"2 The eeriest ballads, however, are probably those which penetrate the interior of the elfin world, and reveal the stratagems by which its unearthly inhabitants gratify their well-known fondness for human beings. Reference has already been made to ballads in which an elfin knight or a spirit of the waters is described as wooing a woman to destruction; and the effect of progressive civilization was illustrated in eliminating the supernatural elements of the legend. There are also some ballads relating the endeavours of female elves to wile 1 "O, cocks are crowing a merry midnight, 2 The last four verses are taken from The Wife being finer than the corresponding verses in The Owsenford. Clerk Saunders. of Usher's Well, as Clerk's twa Sons o' Legends of men to their mysterious dwelling-place. both these kinds are numerous in the early literature of the Teutonic nations; and, indeed, tales of an essentially identical import are scattered throughout all Aryan mythology, possibly traceable to a primeval metaphor, which spoke, on the one hand, of the Day being charmed by the awful beauty of the Night away to her invisible home, and, on the other hand, of the Night or the Dawn disappearing in the embrace of the Day. Let us take an example of the legends in which the charmer is a mermaid. In all these the plot is essentially similar. The hero is fascinated by the glance or gesture or song of the mermaid, and dies or is lured into the water, while a shout of elfin revelry is heard, or some other of elfin merriment is observed, over the success of her charm. Herd has preserved an imperfect specimen in Clerk Colvill, or the Mermaid; and another, entitled The Mermaid, of more poetical merit, though of more modern appearance, was obtained by Finlay from the recitation of a lady, who informed him that it had once been popular on the Carrick coast. It is worth quoting: Sign "To yon fause stream, that near the sea Hides mony an elf an' plum, And rives wi' fearfu' din the stanes, A witless knicht did come. "The day shines clear,-far in he's gane Whar shells are silver bright, 1 See Cox's "Mythology of the Aryan Nations," vol. i. pp. 394-415. Fishes war loupin' a' aroun', And sparklin' to the light: "Whan as he laved, sounds cam sae sweet Frae ilka rock an' tree, The brief was out, 'twas him it doomed "Frae 'neath a rock, sune, sune she rose, Stopped in the midst, an' becked an' sang To him to stretch his haun'. "Gowden glist the yellow links, That round her neck she'd twine; Her een war o' the skyie blue, "The smile upon her bonnie cheek "Sae couthie, couthie did she look, Out shot his hand, alas, alas! Fast in the swirl he screeched. “The mermaid leuch, her brief was gane, "Aboon the stream his wraith was seen, That e'en was coarse, the blast blew hoarse, E'er lang the waves war foamin'." Another and more familiar ballad, which relates the disappearance of a man to the elfin world, is Thomas the Rhymer,1 in which the Queen of the Fairies herself plays the charmer's part. The hero of this ballad, as is well known, occupies a distinguished place in the legendary history and literature of Scotland. Gifted, in popular tradition, not only with the power of the poet, but with the insight of the prophet, he was believed to have attained his superhuman knowledge by a daring intrigue with the Fairy Queen, as the legend of the pious Numa Pompilius attributed to his intercourse with the nymph Egeria the suggestion of the religious institutions which were traced to his reign. As True Thomas lay on the fairy-haunted Huntly Bank,2-so runs the legend,—he saw a bright lady in raiment of "grass green silk," with innumerable silver bells tinkling at her horse's mane. Warned that if he kiss her lips she will become mistress of his fate, he cries "Betide me weal, betide me woe, That weird shall never daunton me.' 1 Scott's "Border Minstrelsy," vol. iv. p. 117. The reader will find it interesting to compare the English ballad on the same subject given by Jamieson ("Popular Ballads and Songs," vol. ii. p. 11). This ballad is preserved, with variations, in three MSS., which are collated by Jamieson. A beautiful Danish ballad on a similar legend, Sir Olaf and the Elf King's Daughter, has been translated into Scotch by the same writer (Ibid. vol. i. p. 219). 2 This spot in the neighbourhood of Melrose was purchased by Sir Walter Scott, at probably fifty per cent. above its real value, that it might be included in the Abbotsford estate. "Now, ye maun go wi' me,' she said; The steed flew swifter than the wind." So sped on the elfin steed with elfin velocity, till they reached a wide desert, where "living land was left behind." Here they lighted down, and while True Thomas rests his head upon the Fairy Queen's knee, she shows him three wonders. First, she reveals to him the narrow road of righteousness, beset with thorns and briars; then "the braid, braid road" of wickedness that lies across a lawn of lilies; and last of all, she points to a "bonny road that winds about the fernie brae,” as the road to fair Elf-land, by which they must go. Again they mount the elfin steed, which flies on as before:— "O they rade on, and farther on, And they waded through rivers aboon the knee, And they saw neither sun nor moon, But they heard the roaring of the sea. “It was mirk mirk night, and there was nae stern light, And they waded through red blude to the knee; For a' the blude that's shed on earth Runs through the springs o' that countrie. "Syne they came to a garden green, And she pu'd an apple frae a tree, 'Take this for thy wages, true Thomas; It will give thee the tongue that can never lie.' |