HOBIE NOBLE_The English and Scottish popular ballads, volume 4 (of 5)

#a.# Caw’s Poetical Museum, p. 193.

#b.# ‘Hobie Noble,’ Percy Papers.

Scott’s Minstrelsy, I, 164, 1802, II, 90, 1833. The source is not

mentioned, but was undoubtedly Caw’s Museum, though there are variations

of text, attributable to the editor. A copy in the Campbell MSS, I, 230,

is again from the Museum, with several corrections, two of which are

also found in Scott. Caw received the ballad, says Sir Walter, from John

Elliot of Reidheugh. #b# seems to have been sent Percy (with ‘Dick o the

Cow’) by Roger Halt, in 1775.

Hobie Noble, though banished from Bewcastle for his irregularities, will

always command the hearty liking of those who live too late to suffer

from them, on account of his gallant bearing in the rescue of Jock o the

Side. See especially No 187, #A#, of which Hobie is the hero. All that

we know of him is so much as we are told in that ballad and in this. He

attached himself, after his expulsion from England, to the laird of

Mangerton, who gives him the praise ‘Thy coat is blue, thou has been

true.’

Sim o the Mains, an Armstrong of the Whithaugh branch (the most

important after that of Mangerton), undertakes to betray Hobie to the

English land-sergeant. A tryst is set at Kershope-foot, the junction of

that stream with the Liddel; and Hobie, who lives a little way up the

Liddel, rides eagerly down the water to keep it. He meets five men, who

ask him to join them in a raid into England. Hobie dares not go by day;

the land-sergeant is at feud with him on account of a brother’s death,

in which Hobie must have had a hand, and ‘the great earl of Whitfield’

has suffered from his depredations;[1] but he will be their guide if

they will wait till night. He takes them to the Foulbogshiel, where they

alight, and word is sent by Sim to the land-sergeant at Askerton, his

adversary’s residence; the land-sergeant orders the men of the

neighborhood to meet him at daybreak. Hobie has a bad dream, wakes his

comrades in alarm, and sets out to guide them across the Waste; but the

sergeant’s force come before him, and Sim behind; his sword breaks; he

is bound with his own bow-string and taken to Carlisle. As he goes up

the quarter called the Rickergate, the wives say one to the other,

That’s the man that loosed Jock o the Side! They offer him bread and

beer, and urge him to confess stealing “my lord’s” horses; he swears a

great oath that he never had beast of my lord’s. He is to die the next

day, and says his farewell to Mangerton; he would rather be called

‘Hobie Noble’ and be hanged in Carlisle, than be called ‘Traitor Mains’

and eat and drink.

Mr R. B. Armstrong informs me that he has found no notice of Hobie Noble

except that Hobbe Noble, with eight others, “lived within the Nyxons,

near to Bewcastle.”

1569. “Lancy Armistrang of Quhithauch obliged him ... for Sym Armistrang

of the Mains and the rest of the Armistrangis of his gang. Syme of the

Mains was lodged in Wester Wemys.” (Register of the Privy Council of

Scotland.)

4. The Mains was a place a very little to the east of Castleton, on the

opposite, or north, side of the Liddel. 13–17. Askerton is in the Waste

of Bewcastle, “about seventeen miles” northeast of Carlisle. “Willeva

and Spear-Edom [otherwise Spade-Adam] are small districts in Bewcastle

dale, through which also the Hartlie-burn takes its course.

Conscowthart-Green and Rodric-haugh and the Foulbogshiel are the names

of places in the same wilds, through which the Scottish plunderers

generally made their raids upon England.” (Scott.)

Sim o the Mains fled into England from the resentment of his chief, but

was himself executed at Carlisle about two months after Hobie’s death.

“Such is at least the tradition of Liddesdale,” says Scott. This is of

course, notwithstanding the precision of the interval of two months,

what Lord Bacon calls “an imagination as one would”; an appendage of a

later generation, in the interest of poetical justice.

* * * * *

Foul fa the breast first treason bred in!

That Liddisdale may safely say,

For in it there was baith meat and drink,

And corn unto our geldings gay.

Fala la diddle, etc.

We were stout-hearted men and true,

As England it did often say;

But now we may turn our backs and fly,

Since brave Noble is seld away.

Now Hobie he was an English man,

And born into Bewcastle dale,

But his misdeeds they were sae great,

They banishd him to Liddisdale.

At Kershope-foot the tryst was set,

Kershope of the lily lee;

And there was traitour Sim o the Mains,

With him a private companie.

Then Hobie has graithd his body weel,

I wat it was wi baith good iron and steel;

And he has pulld out his fringed grey,

And there, brave Noble, he rade him weel.

Then Hobie is down the water gane,

Een as fast as he may drie;

Tho they shoud a’ brusten and broken their hearts,

Frae that tryst Noble he would not be.

‘Weel may ye be, my feiries five!

And aye, what is your wills wi me?’

Then they cryd a’ wi ae consent,

Thou’rt welcome here, brave Noble, to me.

Wilt thou with us in England ride?

And thy safe-warrand we will be,

If we get a horse worth a hundred punds,

Upon his back that thou shalt be.

‘I dare not with you into England ride,

The land-sergeant has me at feid;

I know not what evil may betide

For Peter of Whitfield his brother’s dead.

‘And Anton Shiel, he loves not me,

For I gat twa drifts of his sheep;

The great Earl of Whitfield loves me not,

For nae gear frae me he eer coud keep.

‘But will ye stay till the day gae down,

Until the night come oer the grund,

And I’ll be a guide worth ony twa

That may in Liddisdale be fund.

‘Tho dark the night as pick and tar,

I’ll guide ye oer yon hills fu hie,

And bring ye a’ in safety back,

If you’ll be true and follow me.’

He’s guided them oer moss and muir,

Oer hill and houp, and mony ae down,

Til they came to the Foulbogshiel,

And there brave Noble he lighted down.

Then word is gane to the land-sergeant,

In Askirton where that he lay:

‘The deer that ye hae hunted lang

Is seen into the Waste this day.’

‘Then Hobie Noble is that deer;

I wat he carries the style fu hie!

Aft has he beat your slough-hounds back,

And set yourselves at little ee.

‘Gar warn the bows of Hartlie-burn,

See they shaft their arrows on the wa!

Warn Willeva and Spear Edom,

And see the morn they meet me a’.

‘Gar meet me on the Rodrie-haugh,

And see it be by break o day;

And we will on to Conscowthart Green,

For there, I think, w’ll get our prey.’

Then Hobie Noble has dreamd a dream,

In the Foulbogshiel where that he lay;

He thought his horse was neath him shot,

And he himself got hard away.

The cocks could crow, and the day could dawn,

And I wat so even down fell the rain;

If Hobie had no wakend at that time,

In the Foulbogshiel he had been tane or slain.

‘Get up, get up, my feiries five—

For I wat here makes a fu ill day—

And the warst clock of this companie

I hope shall cross the Waste this day.’

Now Hobie thought the gates were clear,

But, ever alas! it was not sae;

They were beset wi cruel men and keen,

That away brave Noble could not gae.

‘Yet follow me, my feiries five,

And see of me ye keep good ray,

And the worst clock of this companie

I hope shall cross the Waste this day.’

There was heaps of men now Hobie before,

And other heaps was him behind,

That had he been as wight as Wallace was

Away brave Noble he could not win.

Then Hobie he had but a laddies sword,

But he did more than a laddies deed;

In the midst of Conscouthart Green,

He brake it oer Jers a Wigham’s head.

Now they have tane brave Hobie Noble,

Wi his ain bowstring they band him sae;

And I wat his heart was neer sae sair

As when his ain five band him on the brae.

They have tane him [on] for West Carlisle;

They askd him if he knew the way;

Whateer he thought, yet little he said;

He knew the way as well as they.

They hae tane him up the Ricker-gate;

The wives they cast their windows wide,

And ilka wife to anither can say,

That’s the man loosd Jock o the Side!

‘Fy on ye, women! why ca ye me man?

For it’s nae man that I’m usd like;

I’m but like a forfoughen hound,

Has been fighting in a dirty syke.’

Then they hae tane him up thro Carlisle town,

And set him by the chimney-fire;

They gave brave Noble a wheat loaf to eat,

And that was little his desire.

Then they gave him a wheat loaf to eat

And after that a can o beer;

Then they cried a’, wi ae consent,

Eat, brave Noble, and make good cheer!

Confess my lord’s horse, Hobie, they say,

And the morn in Carlisle thou’s no die;

‘How shall I confess them?’ Hobie says,

‘For I never saw them with mine eye.’

Then Hobie has sworn a fu great aith,

By the day that he was gotten or born,

He never had onything o my lord’s

That either eat him grass or corn.

‘Now fare thee weel, sweet Mangerton!

For I think again I’ll neer thee see;

I wad betray nae lad alive,

For a’ the goud in Christentie.

‘And fare thee well now, Liddisdale,

Baith the hie land and the law!

Keep ye weel frae traitor Mains!

For goud and gear he’ll sell ye a’.

‘I’d rather be ca’d Hobie Noble,

In Carlisle, where he suffers for his faut,

Before I were ca’d traitor Mains,

That eats and drinks of meal and maut.’

* * * * *

#a.#