Preservers of the Ballads.

'Some sang ring-sangs, dancis, ledis, roundis,With vocis schil, quhil all the dale resounds,Quhareto they walk into their karoling,For amourous layis dois all the rochis ring:Ane sang 'The schip salis over the salt fame,Will bring thir merchandis and my lemane hame.'

Here we have the expression, to which attention is called, occurring in a popular song in common use before the battle of Flodden. I have seen it remarked, however, that it is the elliptical use of 'sail the faem' for 'sail over the faem,' which indicates an authorship not older than the day of Queen Anne. My answer to this objection shall also be an example from an 'old poet.' One of theTales of theThree Priests of Peblisassigned to the early part of the sixteenth century, describes in homely verse the career of a thrifty burgess, and contains these lines (Sibbald's Chronicle of Scottish Poetry, 1802):â€”

'Then bocht he wool, and wyselie couth it wey;And efter that sone saylit he the sey.'"[31]

These quotations completely set aside one portion of the charge, and the other, in which an attempt is made to show that a similar form of expression is constantly occurring in the several poems, is really of little weight, pressed as it is with some unfairness. We have already seen that the old minstrels used certain forms of expression as helps to memory, andthese recur in ballads that have little or no connection with each other. Chambers, following David Laing, uses Percy's note at the end ofSir Patrick Spence[32]as an engine of attack against the authenticity of the ballad, but there is really no reason for the conclusion he comes to, "that the parity he remarked in the expressions was simply owing to the two ballads being the production of one mind," for a copyist well acquainted with ballad literature would naturally adopt the expressions found in them in his own composition.

II. The consideration of the opinion that Lady Wardlaw was the author ofSir Patrick Spenceand other ballads, need not detain us long, because the main point of interest is their authenticity, and the question of her authorship is quite a secondary matter: that falls to the ground if the grand charge is proved false, and need not stand even if that remains unrefuted. The only reason for fixing upon Lady Wardlaw appears to have been that as these ballads were transmitted to Percy by Lord Hailes, and one of them was an imitation of the antique by Lady Wardlaw, and another was added to by the same lady, therefore if a similarity between the ballads could be proved, it would follow that all were written by her. Now the very fact that the authorship ofHardyknutewas soon discovered is strong evidence against any such supposition, because none of her associates had any suspicion that she had counterfeited other ballads, and could such a wholesale manufacture have been concealed for a century it would be a greater mystery than the vexed question, who was Junius? The other point, whether the author of the indistinct and redundantHardyknutecould have written the clear and incisive lines ofSir Patrick Spencemay be left to be decided by readers who have the two poems before them in these volumes.

A few particulars may, however, be mentioned. The openings of these ballads form excellent contrasted examples of the two different styles of ballad writing.Sir Patrick Spencecommences at once, like other minstrel ballads, with the description of the king and his council:â€”

"The king sits in Dumferling toune,Drinking the blude-reid wine:O quhar will I get guid sailÃ²rTo sail this schip of mine?Up and spak an eldern knicht,Sat at the kings richt kne:Sir Patrick Spence is the best sailÃ²r,That sails upon the se."

"The king sits in Dumferling toune,Drinking the blude-reid wine:O quhar will I get guid sailÃ²rTo sail this schip of mine?

Up and spak an eldern knicht,Sat at the kings richt kne:Sir Patrick Spence is the best sailÃ²r,That sails upon the se."

The king then sends a letter to Spence. There is no description of how this was sent, but we at once read:â€”

"The first line that Sir Patrick red,A loud lauch lauched he;The next line that Sir Patrick red,The teir blinded his ee."

Hardyknute, on the other hand, is full of reasons and illustrative instances in the true ballad-writer's style:â€”

"Stately stept he east the wa',And stately stept he west,Full seventy years he now had seenWi' scarce seven years of rest.He liv'd when Britons breach of faithWrought Scotland mickle wae:And ay his sword tauld to their cost,He was their deadlye fae."

Having placed the openings of the two poems in opposition, we will do the same with the endings.How different is the grand finish ofSir PatrickSpenceâ€”

"Have owre, have owre to Aberdour,It's fiftie fadom deip,And thair lies guid Sir Patrick Spence,Wi' the Scots lords at his feit."

from the feeble conclusion ofHardyknute:â€”

"'As fast I've sped owre Scotlands faes,'â€”There ceas'd his brag of weir,Sair sham'd to mind ought but his dame,And maiden fairly fair.Black fear he felt, but what to fearHe wist nae yet; wi' dreadSai shook his body, sair his limbs,And a' the warrior fled."

Sir Patrick Spencegives us a clear picture that a painter could easily reproduce, butHardyknuteis so vague that it is sometimes difficult to follow it with understanding, and if the same author wrote them both she must have been so strangely versatile in her talents that there is no difficulty in believing that she wrote all the romantic ballads of Scotland.

How little Chambers can be trusted may be seen in the following passage, where he writes: "The first hint at the real author came out through Percy, who in his second edition of theReliques(1767) gives the following statement, 'There is more than reason,' &c.,[33]to which he adds the note: 'It is rather remarkable that Percy was not informed of these particulars in 1765; but in 1767,Sir John Hope Bruce havingdied in the interval(June, 1766), they were communicated to him. It looks as if the secret had hung on the life of this venerable gentleman." Who would suspect, what is the real fact of the case, that Percy's quoted preface was actually printed in his first edition(1765), and that Chambers's remarks fall to the ground because they are founded on a gross blunder.[34]

Printed broadsides are peculiarly liable to accidents which shorten their existence, and we therefore owe much to the collectors who have saved some few of them from destruction. Ballads were usually pasted on their walls by the cottagers, but they were sometimes collected together in bundles. Motherwell had "heard it as a by-word in some parts of Stirlingshire that a collier's library consists but of four books, the Confession of Faith, the Bible, a bundle of Ballads, and Sir William Wallace. The first for the gudewife, the second for the gudeman, the third for their daughter, and the last for the son, a selection indicative of no mean taste in these grim mold-warps of humanity."[35]

The love of a good ballad has, however, never been confined to the uneducated. Queen Mary II., after listening to the compositions of Purcell, played by the composer himself, asked Mrs. Arabella Hunt to sing Tom D'Urfey's ballad of "Cold and Raw," which was set to a good old tune, and thereby offended Purcell's vanity, who was left unemployed at the harpsichord. Nevertheless, the composer had the sense afterwards to introduce the tune as the bass of a song he wrote himself. When ballads were intendedfor the exclusive use of the ordinary ballad-buyers they were printed in black letter, a type that was retained for this purpose for more than a century after it had gone out of use for other purposes. According to Pepys the use of black letter ceased about the year 1700, and on the title-page of his collection he has written "the whole continued down to the year 1700, when the form till then peculiar thereto, viz. of the black letter with pictures, seems (for cheapness sake) wholly laid aside for that of the white letter without pictures." White-letter printing of non-political street ballads really commenced about 1685, and of political ballads about half a century earlier. The saving referred to by Pepys as being made by the omission of woodcuts could not have been great, for they seldom illustrated the letterpress, and were used over and over again, so that cuts which were executed in the reign of James I. were used on ballads in Queen Anne's time.

Until about the year 1712 ballads were universally printed on broadsides, and those intended to be sold in the streets are still so printed, but after that date such as were intended to be vended about the country were printed so as to fold into book form.

The great ballad factory has been for many years situated in Seven Dials, where Pitts employed Corcoran and was the patron of "slender Ben," "over head and ears Nic," and other equally respectably named poets. The renowned Catnach lived in Seven Dials, and left a considerable business at his death. He was the first to print yards of songs for a penny, and his fame was so extended, that his name has come to be used for a special class of literature.

Although, thanks to the labours of far-sighted men, our stock of old ballads and songs is large, weknow that those which are irrevocably lost far exceed them in number. It is therefore something to recover even the titles of some of these, and we can do this to a considerable extent by seeking them in some of the old specimens of literature. InCockelbie's Sow, a piece written about 1450, which was printed in Laing'sSelect Remains of the AncientPopular Poetry of Scotland(Edinburgh, 1822), there is a list of the songs sung at a meeting. In Henryson's curious old pastoral,Robin and Makyne(vol. 2, p. 85), reference is made to the popular tales and songs, which were even then old:â€”

"Robin, thou hast heard sung and say,In gests and storys auld,'The man that will not when he maySall hav nocht when he wald.'"

To the prologues of Gawin Douglas's translation of Virgil'sÃ†neid, we are indebted for a knowledge of four old songs, a fact that outweighs in the opinion of some the merits of the work itself, which was the first translation of a classic that ever appeared in England.

In the Catalogue of Captain Cox's Library, printed in Laneham's letter on the Kenilworth entertainments, there is a short list of some of the popular ballads of his time, but it is sorely tantalizing to read of "a bunch of ballets and songs all auncient," "and a hundred more he hath fair wrapt in parchment, and bound with a whipcord." We learn the names of ballads which were popular in old Scotland from theComplaynt of Scotland, a most interesting list, which Mr. Furnivall has fully illustrated and explained in his edition of Laneham. Another source of information for learning the names of songs no longer known to exist are the medleys, which are made up of the first lines of many songs. Theextreme popularity of ballads in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries is reflected in the literature of the time, which is full of allusions to them. Burton, the anatomist of melancholy, who put a little of almost everything into his book, could not be expected to overlook ballads. He says: "The very rusticks and hog-rubbers ... have their wakes, whitson ales, shepherds' feasts, meetings on holy dayes, countrey dances, roundelayes ... instead of odes, epigrams and elegies, &c., they have their ballads, countrey tunes,O the Broom, the bonny,bonny Broom, ditties and songs,Bess a Bell she dothexcel." The favourite songs of Father Rosin, the minstrel in Ben Jonson'sTale of a Tub(act i. sc. 2), areTom Tiler, theJolly Joiner, and theJovial Tinker. The old drama is full of these references, and one of the most frequent modes of revenge against an enemy was to threaten that he should beballaded. Thus Massinger writes:â€”

"I will have theePictur'd as thou art now, and thy whole storySung to some villainous tune in a lewd ballad,And make thee so notorious in the world,That boys in the street shall hoot at thee."[36]

Fletcher sets side by side as equal evils the having one's eyes dug out, and the having one's name sung

"In ballad verse, at every drinking house."[37]

The ballad-writers are called base rogues, and said to "maintaine a St. Anthonie's fire in their noses by nothing but two-penny ale."[38]

Shakspere was not behind his contemporaries in his contemptuous treatment of "odious ballads," or of "these same metre ballad-mongers," but he hasshown by the references inKing LearandHamlethis high appreciation of the genuine old work, and there is no doubt that the creator of Autolycus loved "a ballad but even too well."

There have been two kinds of collectors, viz. those who copied such fugitive poetry as came in their way, and those who bought up all the printed ballads they could obtain.

Of the manuscript collections of old poetry, the three most celebrated are the Maitland MS. in the Pepysian Library, Cambridge, the Bannatyne MS. presented by the Earl of Hyndford to the Advocates' Library, Edinburgh, and the famous folio MS. which formerly belonged to Percy, and is now in the British Museum. The Maitland MS., which contains an excellent collection of Scotch poetry, was formed by Sir Richard Maitland, of Lethington, Lord Privy Seal and Judge in the Court of Session (b. 1496, d. 1586). Selections from this MS. were printed by Pinkerton in 1786.

In the year 1568, when Scotland was visited by the Plague, a certain George Bannatyne, of whom nothing is known, retired to his house to escape infection, and employed his leisure in compiling his most valuable collection of Scottish poetry. This MS. was lent out of the Advocates' Library to Percy, and he was allowed to keep it for a considerable time. Sir David Dalrymple published "Some ancient Scottish Poems" in 1770, which were taken from this MS.

The great Lord Burghley was one of the first to recognize the value of ballads as an evidence of the popular feeling, and he ordered all broadsides to be brought to him as they were published. The learned Selden was also a collector of them, but the Chinese nation was before these wise men, and had realized an idea that has often been suggested inEurope. One of their sacred books is theBook ofSongs, in which the manners of the country are illustrated by songs and odes, the most popular of which were brought to the sovereign for the purpose.

The largest collections of printed ballads are now in Magdalene College, Cambridge, in the Bodleian at Oxford, and in the British Museum. Some smaller collections are in private hands. In taking stock of these collections, we are greatly helped by Mr. Chappell's interesting preface to theRoxburgheBallads. The Pepysian collection deposited in the library of Magdalene College, Cambridge, consisting of 1,800 ballads in five vols., is one of the oldest and most valuable of the collections. It was commenced by Selden, who died in 1654, and continued by Samuel Pepys till near the time of his own death in 1703. Tradition reports that Pepys borrowed Selden's collection, and then "forgot" to return it to the proper owner. Besides these five volumes, there are three vols. of what Pepys calls penny merriments. There are 112 of these, and some are garlands that contain many ballads in each.

Cambridge's rival, Oxford, possesses three collections, viz. Anthony Wood's 279 ballads and collection of garlands, Francis Douce's 877 in four vols., and Richard Rawlinson's 218.

Previously to the year 1845, when the Roxburghe collection was purchased, there were in the British Museum Library about 1,000 ballads, but Mr. Chappell, without counting theRoxburghe Ballads, gives the number as 1292 in 1864. They are as follows:â€”

The celebrated Roxburghe collection was bought by Rodd at Benjamin Heywood Bright's sale in 1845 for the British Museum, the price beingÂ£535. It was originally formed by Robert Harley, first Earl of Oxford, and as John Bagford was one of the buyers employed by the Earl, he is the reputed collector of the ballads. At the sale of the Harleian Library, this collection became the property of James West, P.R.S., and when his books were sold in 1773, Major Thomas Pearson bought it for, it is said,Â£20. This gentleman, with the assistance of Isaac Reed, added to the collection, and bound it in two volumes with printed title-pages, indexes, &c. In 1788, John, Duke of Roxburghe, bought it at Major Pearson's sale forÂ£36 14s.6d., and afterwards added largely to it, making a third volume. At the Duke's sale in 1813, the three volumes were bought forÂ£477 15s., by Harding, who sold them to Mr. Bright for, it is supposed,Â£700. The collection consists of 1335 broadsides, printed between 1567 and the end of the eighteenth century, two-thirds of them being in black letter. Bright added a fourth volume of eighty-five pages, which was bought for the British Museum forÂ£25 5s.

Some early ballads are included in the collection of broadsides in the library of the Society of Antiquaries, and a collection of proclamations and ballads was made by Mr. Halliwell Phillipps, and presented by him to the Chetham Library at Manchester.

The late George Daniel picked up a valuable collection of ballads at an old shop in Ipswich, whichis supposed to have come from Helmingham Hall, Suffolk, where it had lain unnoticed or forgotten for two centuries or more. It originally numbered 175 to 200 ballads, but was divided by Daniel, who sold one portion (consisting of eighty-eight ballads) to Thorpe, who disposed of it to Heber. At Heber's sale it was bought by Mr. W. H. Miller, of Britwell, and from him it descended to Mr. S. Christie Miller. Twenty-five ballads known to have belonged to the same collection were edited by Mr. Payne Collier for the Percy Society in 1840. The portion that Daniel retained was bought at the sale of his library by Mr. Henry Huth, who has reprinted seventy-nine of the best ballads. Other known private collections are five volumes belonging to Mr. Frederic Ouvry, President of the Society of Antiquaries, which contain Mr. Payne Collier's collection of Black-letter Ballads, the Earl of Jersey's at Osterley Park, and one which was formed by Mr. Halliwell Phillipps, who printed a full catalogue of the ballads contained in it, and then disposed of it to the late Mr. William Euing of Glasgow.

We owe our gratitude to all these collectors, but must also do honour to those writers who in advance of their age tried to lead their contemporaries to fresher springs than those to which they were accustomed. The first of these was Addison, who commented on the beauties ofChevy Chaseand theChildren in theWoodin theSpectator. He wrote: "it is impossible that anything should be universally tasted and approved by a multitude, though they are only the rabble of a nation, which hath not in it some peculiar aptness to please and gratify the mind of man."

Rowe was another appreciator of this popular literature, and his example and teaching may have had its influence in the publication of the firstCollectionof Old Ballads, for the motto to the firstvolume is taken from the prologue to Rowe'sJaneShore(first acted in 1713):â€”

"Let no nice sir despise the hapless dameBecause recording ballads chaunt her name;Those venerable ancient song enditersSoar'd many a pitch above our modern writers.They caterwauled in no romantic ditty,Sighing for Philis's or Cloe's pity;Justly they drew the Fair and spoke her plain,And sung her by her Christian nameâ€”'twas Jane.Our numbers may be more refined than those,But what we've gain'd in verse, we've lost in prose;Their words no shuffling double meaning knew,Their speech was homely, but their hearts were true."

Parnell, Tickell, and Prior belonged to the small band who had the taste to appreciate the unfashionable old ballad. Prior says of himself in a MS. essay quoted by Disraeli in theCalamities of Authors: "I remember nothing further in life than that I made verses: I chose Guy Earl of Warwick for my first hero, and killed Colborne the giant before I was big enough for Westminster school." The few were, however, unable to convert the many, and Dr. Wagstaffe, one of the wits of the day, ridiculed Addison for his good taste, and in a parody of the famous essay onChevy Chasehe commented upon theHistory of Tom Thumb, and pretended to point out the congenial spirit of this poet with Virgil.

There is still another class of preservers of ballads to be mentioned, viz. those whose tenacious memories allow them to retain the legends and songs they heard in their youth, but as Prof. Aytoun writes: "No Elspats of the Craigburnfoot remain to repeat to grandchildren that legendary lore which they had acquired in years long gone by from the last of the itinerant minstrels." The most celebrated of these retailers of the old ballads was Mrs. Brown of Falkland, wife of the Rev. Dr. Brown, for from her both Scott andJamieson obtained some of their best pieces. Her taste for the songs and tales of chivalry was derived from an aunt, Mrs. Farquhar, "who was married to the proprietor of a small estate near the sources of the Dee in Braemar, a good old woman, who spent the best part of her life among flocks and herds, [but] resided in her latter years in the town of Aberdeen. She was possest of a most tenacious memory, which retained all the songs she had heard from nurses and countrywomen in that sequestered part of the country."[39]Doubts have been expressed as to the good faith of Mrs. Brown, but they do not appear to be well grounded. Another of these ladies from whose mouths we have learnt so much of the ever-fading relics of the people's literature was Mrs. Arrot.

The earliest printed collection of Scottish popular poetry known to exist is a volume printed at Edinburgh, "by Walter Chepman and Androw Myllar, in the year 1508," which was reprinted in facsimile by David Laing in 1827. The next work of interest in the bibliography of ballads is "Ane Compendious Booke of Godly and Spirituall Songs, collected out of sundrie partes of the Scripture, with sundrie of other ballates, chainged out of prophaine songs for avoiding of Sinne and Harlotrie," printed in 1590 and 1621, and reprinted by J. G. Dalzell in 1801, and by David Laing in 1868. It contains parodies of some of the songs mentioned in theComplaintof Scotland, and is supposed to be the work of three brothersâ€”James, John, and Robert Wedderburn, of Dundee. To the last of the three Mr. Laing attributed theComplaint, but Mr. Murray, the latest editor of that book, is unable to agree with him.

The first book of "prophane" songs published in Scotland was a musical collection entitled "CantusSongs and Fancies to several musicall parts, both apt for voices and viols: with a brief introduction to musick, as it is taught by Thomas Davidson in the Musick School of Aberdeen. Aberdeen, printed by John Forbes." 1662, 1666, and 1682.

The next work in order of time is "A Choise Collection of Comic and Serious Scots Poems, both ancient and modern, by several hands. Edinburgh, printed by James Watson." In three parts, 1706, 1709, 1710. Supposed to have been compiled by John Spottiswood, author ofHope's Minor Practicks.

All these works emanated from Scotchmen, and the only works of the same character that were published in England were small collections of songs and ballads, called Garlands and Drolleries. These are too numerous to be noticed here; but that they were highly popular may be judged from the fact that a thirteenth edition ofThe Golden Garland of PrincelyDelightis registered. The Garlands are chiefly small collections of songs on similar subjects. Thus, there were Love's Garlands, Loyal Garlands, Protestant Garlands, &c. Considerable pains seem to have been taken in order to obtain attractive titles for these little brochures. Thus, on one we read:â€”

"The sweet and the sower,The nettle and the flower,The thorne and the rose,This garland compose."

Drolleries were collections of "jovial poems" and "merry songs," and some of them were confined to the songs sung at the theatres.

One of the first English collections of any pretensions was Dryden'sMiscellany Poems, published in 1684-1708, which was shortly after followed by Tom D'Urfey'sWit and Mirth, or Pills to Purge Melancholy, 1719-20. But the first attempt to bring together a large number of popular ballads, as distinguished from songs, was made in "A Collection of Old Ballads, corrected from the best and most ancient copies extant, with Introductions historical, critical, or humorous." London. Vols I. and II. 1723. Vol. III. 1725.

The object of most of the works referred to above was the publication of songs to be sung; the object of this one was the presentment of ballads to be read. It had a large sale, and the editor (who is said to have been Ambrose Phillips) expresses his satisfaction in the Preface to Vol. II.: "Though we printed a large edition for such a trifle, and in less than two months put it to the press again, yet could we not get our second edition out before it was really wanted." In spite, however, of its satisfactory reception, it does not appear to have taken any permanent position in literature, although it must have prepared the public mind to receive theReliques. This collection contains one hundred and fifty-nine ballads, out of which number twenty-three are also in theReliques.[40]Many of the others are of considerable interest, but some had better have been left unprinted, and all are of little critical value.

In the year after the first two volumes of the English collection were published, Allan Ramsay issuedin Edinburgh "The Evergreen, being a collection of Scots poems wrote by the ingenious before 1600," the principal materials of which were derived from the Bannatyne MS. This was followed in the same year (1724) by "The Tea-Table Miscellany: a Collection of choice Songs, Scots and English," a work which is frequently referred to by Percy in the following pages. In neither of these works was Ramsay very particular as to the liberties he allowed himself in altering his originals. In order to make the volumes fit reading for his audience, which he hoped would consist of

"Ilka lovely British lass,Frae ladies Charlotte, Ann, and Jean,Down to ilk bonnie singing lassWha dances barefoot on the green,"

Ramsay pruned the songs of their indelicacies, and filled up the gaps thus made in his own way. TheTea-table Miscellanycontains upwards of twenty presumably old songs, upwards of twelve old songs much altered, and about one hundred songs written by the editor himself, Crawford, Hamilton, and others.

In 1725, William Thomson, a teacher of music in London, brought out a collection of Scottish songs, which he had chiefly taken from theTea-table Miscellanywithout acknowledgment. He called his bookOrpheus Caledonius.

For some years before Percy's collection appeared, the Foulises, Glasgow's celebrated printers, issued from their press, under the superintendence of Lord Hailes, various Scottish ballads, luxuriously printed with large type, in a small quarto size.

These were the signs that might have shown the far-sighted man that a revival was at hand. At last the time came when, tired out with the dreary and leaden regularity of the verse-writers of the day, the people were ready to receive poetry fresh from nature. The man who arose to supply the want (which was none the less a want that it was an unrecognized one) was Thomas Percy, a clergyman living in a retired part of the country, but occasionally seen among theliteratiof the capital.

Thomas Percy was born on April 13th, 1729, at Bridgnorth in Shropshire, in a street called the Cartway. His father and grandfather were grocers, spelt their name Piercy, and knew nothing of any connection with the noble house of Northumberland.[41]His early education was received at the grammar school of Bridgnorth, and in 1746, being then in his eighteenth year, and having obtained an exhibition, he matriculated as a commoner at Christ Church, Oxford.

He took the degree of B.A. on May 2nd, 1750, that of M.A. on July 5th, 1753, and shortly after was presented by his college to the living of Easton Maudit, in the county of Northampton. In this poor cure he remained for twenty-five years, and inthe little vicarage his six children (Anne, Barbara, Henry, Elizabeth, Charlotte, and Hester), were all born. Percy's income was increased in 1756 by the gift of the rectory of Wilby, an adjacent parish, in the patronage of the Earl of Sussex, and on April 24th, 1759, he married Anne, daughter of Barton Gutteridge,[42]who was his beloved companion for forty-seven years. It was to this lady, before his marriage to her, that Percy wrote his famous song, "O Nancy, wilt thou go with me?" Miss Matilda LÃ¦titia Hawkins stated in herMemoirs, that these charming verses were intended by Percy as a welcome to his wife on her release from a twelve-month's confinement in the royal nursery, and Mr. Pickford follows her authority in hisLife of Percy, but this is an entire mistake, for the song was printed as early as the year 1758 in the sixth volume of Dodsley'sCollection of Poems. Anyone who reads the following verses will see, that though appropriate as a lover's proposal, they are very inappropriate as a husband's welcome home to his wife.

"O Nancy, wilt thou go with me,Nor sigh to leave the flaunting town?Can silent glens have charms for thee,The lowly cot and russet gown?No longer drest in silken sheen,No longer deck'd with jewels rare,Say, canst thou quit each courtly scene,Where thou wert fairest of the fair?"O Nancy, when thou'rt far away,Wilt thou not cast a wish behind?Say, canst thou face the parching ray,Nor shrink before the wintry wind?O, can that soft and gentle mienExtremes of hardship learn to bear,Nor, sad, regret each courtly scene,Where thou wert fairest of the fair?"O Nancy, canst thou love so true,Through perils keen with me to go?Or, when thy swain mishap shall rue,To share with him the pang of woe?Say, should disease or pain befall,Wilt thou assume the nurse's care?Nor wistful, those gay scenes recall,Where thou wert fairest of the fair?"And when at last thy love shall die,Wilt thou receive his parting breath?Wilt thou repress each struggling sigh,And cheer with smiles the bed of death?And wilt thou o'er his breathless clayStrew flowers, and drop the tender tear?Nor then regret those scenes so gay,Where thou wert fairest of the fair?"

"O Nancy, when thou'rt far away,Wilt thou not cast a wish behind?Say, canst thou face the parching ray,Nor shrink before the wintry wind?O, can that soft and gentle mienExtremes of hardship learn to bear,Nor, sad, regret each courtly scene,Where thou wert fairest of the fair?

"O Nancy, canst thou love so true,Through perils keen with me to go?Or, when thy swain mishap shall rue,To share with him the pang of woe?Say, should disease or pain befall,Wilt thou assume the nurse's care?Nor wistful, those gay scenes recall,Where thou wert fairest of the fair?

"And when at last thy love shall die,Wilt thou receive his parting breath?Wilt thou repress each struggling sigh,And cheer with smiles the bed of death?And wilt thou o'er his breathless clayStrew flowers, and drop the tender tear?Nor then regret those scenes so gay,Where thou wert fairest of the fair?"

By the alteration of a few words, such asgangforgo,tounfortown, &c., "Oh Nanny, wilt thou gang with me?" was transposed into a Scotch song, and printed as such in Johnson'sMusical 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 calledThe young Laird and EdinburghKate, printed in Ramsay'sTea-Table Miscellany, the second stanza of which is somewhat similarâ€”

"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 ofThe Young Lairdand Edinburgh Katy, and the Bishop, took the idea of their ballads from a song in Lee's beautiful tragedy ofTheodosius, 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 calledThe Royal Nun, and the first stanza is as follows:â€”

"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 repairTo 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 withO 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 inscribedOh 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 editthe 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 Poetryâ€”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 hisReliques, 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 theReliques, which gave Percy a name, and obtainedfor 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 NorthumberlandHouseholdBook, 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'sNorthern Antiquities. Each of these three works was the first of its class, and created a taste which produced a literature of the same character. TheHousehold Bookgave 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 theReliques. The agreements he made with the Tonsons were fifty guineas for Buckingham'sWorksand twenty guineas for Surrey'sPoems. He also agreed to edit theSpectatorandGuardian, 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 nurseto 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 theHermitof Warkworth, which exhibited his continued interest in the subject of theReliques, 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, worthÂ£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 theReliquesfor 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 byfire, 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 theAthenÃ¦umfor 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 â€”â€” on a Tempestuous Night,March 22, 1788, by Dr. Percy.

Back to Index Next