dust and cobwebs of an uncivil æra. In Scotland, the distinction between Ballad and Song, never has attained that nicety of limit as it has done in England; English Songs being almost wholly of sentiment and description, the majority of Scottish Songs down to the present day, of story mingled with sentiment.* To discriminate exactly the line between Song and Ballad in Scotland, would be a difficult, if not an impossible undertaking; the country girl, or the ploughman lad, would as soon sing you Chevy Chace or William and Margaret, as any of Burns' shorter lyrics; indeed, if there is equal beauty of story and sentiment contained throughout both, she would prefer the longer narrative, never for a moment wanting heart or dreading the power of her lungs to carry her on. In England this boundary line is very perceptible; the story of the ballad being easily distinguished from the epigrammatic force of their songs, which are generally better to read than to sing; for how few have the voice or the feeling suitable to increase the beauty of a lovely thought, compared to those that can give animation to a story? Narrative or dramatic lyrics will always be the favourites of the people, and constitute the popular poetry of the land. *"Songs of sentiment, expression, or even description are properly termed songs in contradistinction to mere narrative compositions, which we now denominate ballads. A similar idea is adopted by the Spaniards." Essay on English Song,,-RITSON, What songs shall we find sung in the cottages of England; whoever heard Marlowe's' Shepherd to his Love,' or any of Jonson's exquisite lyrics, Sung to the wheel and sung unto the pail '— HALL. or Wither's admirable ballads, or any of the elegant and fanciful conceits of Mr. Moore. Gay and Dibdin are popular, and why are they popular? because incident and sentiment are blended in their songs; 'the Storm' and 'Savourna Delish,' are also of the same cast, and are equally popular. The good popular songs of England would fill a very few pages, and the majority of even the mediocre ones, are unworthy of being set up in a ballad type. The pastoral lyrics of Lodge, Drayton, Davison and others, certainly considered by their authors as songs, and intended to be sung, have now left the rank of songs to be classed as ballads. Pastoral lyrics of the same kind in Scotland, are considered as songs, such as Tweedside and the Broom of Cowdenknowes: we may account for this difference by the English pastorals being written to no popular air, and the Scottish being wedded to the music of their own nation. METRICAL ROMANCES.-The remarks made in the former Introduction on our old Metrical Romances, are equally applicable to Scotland. The most celebrated Romance the work of a Northern Minstrel, is Sir Tristrem; if,' says Scott, 'Thomas of Erceldoune did not translate from the French, but composed an original poem, founded upon Celtic tradition, it will follow that the first classical English Romance was written in part of what is now called Scotland.'* BALLAD AND SONG.-The most ancient ballad it is generally allowed, of which we are in possession, whether it relates to the Maid of Norway or not, is 'Sir Patrick Spens'. It would be unfair to quote it as a specimen of the language of King Alexander III's reign; for in descending the stream of tradition, it has lost much of the hue of that period, and the old thoughts have become clothed in a modern language. In shewing the garb worn by our muses in former years, we must not quote sentiments of one period, and language of another, at a distance of centuries; for we owe the ballad of Sir Patrick Spens to the lips of spinsters and knitters in the sun who chanted it but a few years back. To the old rhyming chronicler Andrew Wyntown, nevertheless, we are indebted for the preservation of *Sir Tristrem, Ed. 1833, p. 48. "Tradition, generally speaking, is a sort of perverted alchemy which converts gold into lead. All that is abstractedly poetical, all that is above the comprehension of the merest peasant, is apt to escape in frequent recitation; and the lacune thus created, are filled up either by lines from other ditties, or from the mother-wit of the reciter or singer. The injury, in either case, is obvious and irrepara ble." Quar. Rev. vol. i. 30.-SCOTT. With all deference to the opinion of so great a man, is it not just as likely that these alterations are as often for the better as the worse, If through tradition we have not gained all the correctness both of thought and language of the old songs and ballads, we have certainly gained much of the sentiment and all the spirit. a stanza giving us some insight into song:-on the death of Alexander III. in 1286, 'this song was made' Quhen Alysander oure kynge wes dede, That Scotland led in luwe and le, Away wes sons off ale and brede, Off wyne and wax, off gamyn and gle; The fate of Wallace was, as we may well suppose, the subject of several songs, some of which are referred to by Fordun; and the Battle of Bannockburn was sung of in a strain, pronounced by Ritson, not inelegant for the time:' according to Fabyan, the Scottes enflamyd with pride, in derysyon of Englyshemen, made this ryme as followeth :" Maydens of Englande, sore may ye mourne For your lemmans ye have lost at Bannockysborne ! What! weneth the Kyng of England So soone to have wone Scotland? Wyth rumbylowe. was 'Thys song,' the old chronicler continues, after many daies song in daunces, in the caroles of ye maydens and mynstrellys of Scotland, to the reproofe and dysdayne of Englyshemen, with dyuerse other whych I ouerpasse.' Mr. Motherwell supposes these lines to form all that ever existed of the song.* * Minstrelsy, p. xlviii. Barbour in his Life of Bruce, refrains from tell ing a victory gained by Sir John de Soulis over the English, for whasa liks, thai may her Young wemen, whan thai will play Syng it amang thaim ilk day.-Book xvI. The two ballads of the Battle of Otterbourne, the English and Scottish copies, and the famous Chevy Chase, belong to the reign of King James, the first of that name. Godscroft speaking of the ballad on the Battle of Otterbourne, says, the Scots song made of Otterbourne, beginneth thus'- It fell about the Lammas tide In England to take a prey. 6 Hist. of Douglas, vol. i. p. 195. James the First, himself an author of fine genius, and a writer of songs (all unhappily lost), has in his 'Peblis to the Play,' made several allusions to song, and quoted the starting lines of two songs well-known, perhaps,' says Geo. Chalmers, Verse 6. My hony heart, how says the song? in the Of Peblis to the Play. Yet Verse 25. |