From _The Border Minstrelsy_; the original was derived from a lady living
near Erceldoune (Earlston), and from Mrs. Brown’s MSS. That Thomas of
Erceldoune had some popular fame as a rhymer and soothsayer as early as
1320–1350, seems to be established. As late as the Forty Five, nay, even
as late as the expected Napoleonic invasion, sayings attributed to Thomas
were repeated with some measure of belief. A real Thomas Rymer of
Erceldoune witnessed an undated deed of Peter de Haga, early in the
thirteenth century. The de Hagas, or Haigs of Bemersyde, were the
subjects of the prophecy attributed to Thomas,
“Betide, betide, whate’er betide,
There will aye be a Haig in Bemersyde,”
and a Haig still owns that ancient _château_ on the Tweed, which has a
singular set of traditions. Learmont is usually given as the Erceldoune
family name; a branch of the family owned Dairsie in Fifeshire, and were
a kind of hereditary provosts of St. Andrews. If Thomas did predict the
death of Alexander III., or rather report it by dint of clairvoyance, he
must have lived till 1285. The date of the poem on the Fairy Queen,
attributed to Thomas, is uncertain, the story itself is a variant of
“Ogier the Dane.” The scene is Huntly Bank, under Eildon Hill, and was
part of the lands acquired, at fantastic prices, by Sir Walter Scott.
His passion for land was really part of his passion for collecting
antiquities. The theory of Fairyland here (as in many other Scottish
legends and witch trials) is borrowed from the Pre-Christian Hades, and
the Fairy Queen is a late refraction from Persephone. Not to eat, in the
realm of the dead, is a regular precept of savage belief, all the world
over. Mr. Robert Kirk’s _Secret Commonwealth of Elves_, _Fauns_, _and
Fairies_ may be consulted, or the Editor’s _Perrault_, p. xxxv. (Oxford,
1888). Of the later legends about Thomas, Scott gives plenty, in _The
Border Minstrelsy_. The long ancient romantic poem on the subject is
probably the source of the ballad, though a local ballad may have
preceded the long poem. Scott named the glen through which the Bogle
Burn flows to Chiefswood, “The Rhymer’s Glen.”